OLD NEW YORK. 



■4»» " 



Historical Discourse. 



OLD NEW YORK; 



OR, 



Reminiscences of the Past 
Sixty Years. 



BEING 



AN ENLARGED AND REVISED EDITION 



OF THE 



Anniversary Discourse 



DELIVERED BEFORE 



The New York Historical Society, 

(November 17, 1857,) 



A#^^^ 



<iP- 



BY 



John W. Francis, M. D., LL. D. 



NEW YORK : 
CHARLES ROE, 6gj BROADWAY, 

1858. 



f ^3 



Ehtebed, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, by 

SAMUEL W. FPwANCIS, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the 
Southern District of New York. 



PEEF ACE. 



The continued demand for this Discourse, and 
tlie interest expressed in its general scope and 
aim, have induced the author to prepare a new 
edition, the original one having been exhausted 
shortly after its pubhcation. He has improved 
the opportunity thus afforded, to make several 
additions, some of which, he trusts, wiU be found 
to add materially to the biographical data, and 
others to augment the record of incidents which 
have marked the annals of the city. 

It will be observed that, as in the first edi- 
tion, these additions have a relation more or less 
immediate, with the origin and progress of the 
New York Historical Society : the plan of the 
Discourse, therefore, at first adopted, has in no 



6 PREFACE. 

manner been changed. The numerous occur- 
rences which have characterized the history of 
the metropolis, during the period under con- 
sideration, however briefly told, might fill vol- 
umes, but such an undertaking is left for others 
to perform. The social movements of a city which, 
from time to time, engage the attention of the peo- 
ple, betray something, at least, of the phases which 
illustrate the actual state of society at the period : 
with this view farther notices are given of Eccle- 
siastical affairs ; the Dramatic incidents have been 
enlarged ; some account has been inserted of 
Clubs — friendly, social, patriotic, and literary ; 
some details have been given of the advancement 
of the Fine Arts among us ; and to that pro- 
fession to which the affections of the author have 
ever been most inclined, he has added particulars 
which may serve as a guide to the future Med- 
ical historian : a brief parallel drawn between the 
New York of Sixty Years Ago, and its present 
commanding attitude, closes this humble volume. 
There is one practical inference which the in- 
terest expressed in these Eeminiscences justifies : 
it is, that our local historians have a great duty to 
perform, in rescuing from oblivion and recording 



PREFACE. 7 

with emphasis and completeness, the history of the 
men, the measures, and the events which render 
our native State and City illustrious. Compare 
the full annals of the smallest New England town 
with the fragmentary and meagre chronicles which 
describe the scenes and characters of this State 
and MetropoHs. Gouverneur Morris eloquently as- 
serted the claim of New York to original and in- 
stinctive aspirations for Liberty, a fact which some 
of our eastern brethren, those proHfic votaries of 
the pen, have either ignored or traced to a Puritan 
origin ; and a younger, but not less patriotic son 
of our State, Charles F. Hoffman, was justly indig- 
nant that two of her noblest children owe their 
renown to New England historians. " Children 
of commerce,'* says Gouverneur Morris, " we were 
rocked in the cradle of war, and sucked the prin- 
ciples of liberty with our mother's milk." 

Should any hint contained in these pages, in- 
duce those who have more leisure and as much 
attachment to New York as the author, to expand 
into a full and finished narrative, the story which is 
now told but in outline and episode, a fond wish 
of his heart will be gratified. It only remains to 
add, that having revised and enlarged what he had 



8 PREFACE. 

the honor to submit to the Historical Society, he 
trusts it will now be found more worthy of the 
unexpected favor with which it was originally re- 
ceived by the public. 

J. W. F. 

March 30, 1858. 



INTEODUCTION. 



It was considered desirable, on the occasion of in- 
augurating the new and beautiful edifice erected by 
the liberal contributions of the merchants and profes- 
sional gentlemen of this city, for the permanent de- 
posit of the manuscripts, books, and other property 
of the New York Historical Society, that the chief 
elements of civil and social development wliich have 
marked the annals of this metropolis, should be 
sketched in their origin and progress. As this could 
be most effectually done through personal reminis- 
cences, the author of this brief historical record was 
chosen to perform the duty ; partly because he is one 
of the few surviving early members of the Institution, 
and partly on account of the intimate relations he sus- 
tained to many prominent citizens in all departments 
of life and vocation. Alive to the earnestly expressed 
wishes of his fellow-members, and cherishing a deep 
interest in the annals and prosperity of his native city, 
1* 



10 INTRODUCTION. 

while he found the task accordant with his sympathies, 
he yet felt that the absorbing cares of an arduous 
profession were essentially oj^posed to the research 
and finish appropriate to such an enterprise ; and he 
therefore craves the indulgence of his readers, as he 
did that of his audience. As delivered, this survey of 
New York in the past was unavoidably curtailed ; it 
is now presented as originally written. 

The author cherishes the hope that it may be in 
his power, at a future time, to enlarge the record of 
local facts and individuahties associated with the un- 
precedented growth of New York, since and imme- 
diately preceding the formation of her Historical So- 
ciety. It will be seen that his aim has been to review 
the condition of the site, institutions, and character of 
our city, during the last sixty years, and, in a measure, 
to trace their influence on its future prospects : as the 
commercial emporium of the Union and the seat of 
its most prosperous Historical Society, there is every 
reason to hope that our new and extensive arrange- 
ments will secure a large accession of valuable mate- 
rials. Yet those members who bear in recollection 
the vast changes which have occurred within the pe- 
riod of our existence as an association, need not be 
told that the original landmarks and features of the 
metropolis have been either greatly modified or en- 
tu'ely destroyed ; while carelessness, or the neglect of 



INTRODUCTION. . 11 

family memorials, renders it extremely difficult to re- 
produce, with vital interest, even the illustrious per- 
sons who have contributed- most effectually to our 
prosperity and renown. 

If the author succeeds, by means of the present 
brief sketch or a future more elaborate memoir, in 
awakening attention to the men and events which 
have secured the rapid development of resources on 
this island, both economical and social, he will rejoice. 
Such a task, rightly performed, should kindle anew 
our sense of personal responsibility as citizens, of 
gratitude as patriots, and of wise sympathy as 
scholars. Even this inadequate tribute he has re- 
garded as an historical duty, and felt it to be a labor 

of love. 

J. W. F. 

New York, November 17, 1857. 



At a meeting of the NEW YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY, 
held at the Library, on Tuesday evening, November 17, 1857, 
to celebrate the Fifty-Third Anniversary of the founding of 
the Society, — 

Dr. John W. Francis delivered its Anniversary Address, en- 
titled, " New York during the Last Half Century." 

On its conclusion the Rev. Francis L. Hawks, D. D., LL. D., 
after some remarks, submitted the following resolution : 

Resolved, that the thanks of the Society be presented to Dr. 
Francis for his highly interesting address, and that a copy be re- 
quested for publication. 

The resolution was seconded by Charles King, LL. D., and 
was then unanimously adopted. 

Extract from the minutes. 

ANDREW WARNER, 

Recording Secretary. 



HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Honored President and Associates of the 
New York Historical Society : 

What a contrast ! This meeting of tlie New 
York Historical Society and that which was held 
now some fifty years ago. Ponder awhile upon 
the circumstances which mark this difierence. At 
the period at which our first organization took 
place, this city contained about sixty thousand 
inhabitants ; at present it embraces some seven 
hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants. A large 
majority of the residents dwelt below Cortlandt 
street and Maiden Lane. A sparse population 
then occupied that portion of the island which 
lies above the site of the New York Hospital on 
Broadway ; and the grounds now covered with the 
magnificent edifices which ornament Upper Broad- 
way, the Fifth Avenue, Fourteenth street, Union 
Place, and Madison Square, were graced with the 
sycamore, the elm, the oak, the chestnut, the wild 
cherry, the peach, the pear, and the plum tree, 
and further ornamented with gardens appropriated 



14 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

to horticultural products, with lie re and there the 
artichoke, the tulip, and the sun-flower. Where 
now stand our Astor Library, the Mercantile Li- 
brary, the New York Medical College, the Acade- 
my of Music, the Medical University of the State, 
Cooper's Institute, and the Bible Society House, 
the old gardens of our Dutch ancestors were most 
abundant, cultivated with something of the artis- 
tic regularity of the Hollanders, luxuriating in the 
sweet marjoram, the mint, the thyme, the currant, 
and the gooseberry. The banks of our majestic 
rivers on either side presented deep and abrupt 
declivities, and the waters adjacent were devoted 
to the safety of floating timber, brought down 
from the Mohawk, on the Hudson Eiver, or else- 
where obtained, on the Connecticut, in mighty 
rafts, destined for naval architecture and house- 
building. Our avenues, squares, and leading roads, 
were not yet laid out by Morris, Clinton, and 
Kutherfurd, and our street regulations in paving 
and sidewalks, even in those passes or high- 
ways now most populous, had reached but little 
above the Park, and in the Bowery only within 
the precincts of Bayard street. The present City 
Hall was in a state of erection, and so circum- 
scribed, at that time, was the idea of the City's 
progress, that the Common Council, by a slender 
majority, after serious discussion, for economy's 
sake, decided that the postern part of the Hall 



EARLY RESIDENCES. 15 

should be composed of red stone, inasmucli as it 
was not likely to attract much notice from the 
scattered inhabitants who might reside above 
Chambers street. 

Some fifty years ago the most conspicuous of 
the residences of our prominent citizens were the 
Government House at the* Bowling Green, and the 
Kennedy House, now converted into the Wash- 
ington Hotel, No. 1 Broadway, an object of singu- 
lar interest. During the Revolution it was occu- 
pied by Howe and Clinton. Here Andre com- 
menced his correspondence with Arnold ; and here 
John Pintard held an interesting conversation 
with Andre on their respective claims to Hugue- 
not blood. Captain Peter Warren, who erected 
this famous building, was afterwards knighted, 
and became a member of Parliament. The house 
was long occupied by Kennedy, subsequently Earl 
of Cassilis ; and again by Sir Henry Clinton ; 
afterwards it was long held by Nathaniel Prime, 
of the banking house of Prime & Ward. We 
next, in those earlier days, observed the stone 
dwelling, situated at the lower part of Broad- 
way, once occupied by Governor Jay ; the man- 
sion of Governor George Clinton, of revolutionary 
renown, situated near the North River, at the 
termination of Thirteenth street ; Colonel Rutgers' 
somewhat sequestered retreat, near the head of 
Cherry street, where Franklin sometimes took a 



16 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

patriotic meal ; the Hero of Fort Stanwix, Colo- 
nel Willett's humble cottage in the vicinity ; 
General Gfates' ample establishment higher up 
near Twenty-fourth street, overlooking the banks 
of the East Eiver, where Baron Steuben, Colonel 
Burr, and many other actors of the War, partici- 
pated in the festivities, so amply provided by the 
host, with song and sentiment. The famous 
Club of the Belvidere, on the banks of the East 
River, is also entitled to commemoration : at its 
head was Atkinson : here royalty and democracy 
had their alternate revelries, with blessings on the 
king or laudations of the rights of man. Still 
standing, in pride of early state, we notice the 
Beekman House, near Fiftieth street, also on the 
East River banks, where British Officers rendez- 
voused, in revolutionary times ; where Sir Wil- 
liam Howe kept those vigils commemorated in the 
Battle of the Kegs, and where Andre passed his 
last night previous to entering on his disastrous 
mission. Adjacent to the Beekman House recently 
stood the ample Green House, where Nathan Hale, 
called the spy, was examined by Lord Howe, and, 
as such, executed on the following morning, meet- 
ing his fate with heroism, and regretting that he 
had but one life to lose for his country. 

Eminently conspicuous in former days was the 
Mansion, located on Richmond Hill, near Lispe- 
nard's Meadows, at the junction of Yarick and 



RICHMOND HILL. — BURR. 17 

Yan Dam streets, then an elevated and command- 
ing sight. So many now before me must retain a 
strong recollection of this spot, which afterwards 
became the Theatre of the Montressor Opera 
Company, that I am compelled to dwell a moment 
longer concerning it. This imposing edifice was 
built about 1770, by Mortier, the chief paymaster 
of the British government. It was surrounded 
by many and beautiful forest trees ; it was often 
subjected to the annoyances of the sportsmen, and 
Mr. Van Wagenen, a direct descendant of Garret 
Van Wagenen, almost the first and earliest of our 
city schoolmasters, a true son of St. Nicholas, still 
honoring us in his life and in his devotion to New 
York, could give you a curious account of the en- 
joyments of the field on these premises in those 
early days. While Congress sat in this city, this 
celebrated mansion was occupied by the elder 
Adams, and some of the most charming letters of 
the Vice President's wife are dated at this place. 
It subsequently became the residence of Aaron 
Burr, into whose possession it fell, by purchase 
from the executors of Abraham Mortier ; in 1804 
it became by purchase the property of John Jacob 
Astor. While Burr resided there, its halls occa- 
sionally resounded with the merriment which gen- 
erous cheer inspires ; yet at other times, and more 
frequently, philosophy here sat enthroned amidst 
her worshippers. Here Talleyraul, who in the 



18 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

morning had discoursed on the tariff with Hamil- 
ton, passed perhaps the afternoon of the same 
day with Burr, on the suhject of the fur trade and 
commerce with Great Britain, associated with 
Yolney, whose portly form gave outward tokens of 
his tremendous gastric powers, while the Syrian 
traveller, in his turn, descanted on theogony, the 
races of the red men, and Niagara. I cannot well 
conceive of a greater intellectual trio. Perhaps it 
was at one of those con^dvial entertainments that 
the dietetic sentiment originated, in relation to 
some of the social pecuharities among us, that 
our repuhUc, while she could hoast of some two 
hundred varieties of religious creeds, possessed 
only one variety of gravy. 

Here it may be recorded lived Burr, at the 
time of the fatal duel with Hamilton : informed 
by his sagacious second, Van Ness, that the Gen- 
eral was wounded, Burr remarked, " 0, the little 
fellow only feigns hurt," but catching an idea of 
the nature of the wound, from Hamilton's action, 
he hastily left the field, and fled for shelter from 
the wrath of an indignant people, while rumor 
spread that the constituted authorities were in 
search of him. It was beHeved by the populace 
that he had passed through New Jersey toward 
the south, yet on the very afternoon of that fatal 
day, while the whole city was in consternation, 
and on the look-out, he had already reached his 



HAMILTON. CITY HOTEL. 19 

domicile on Eiclimoiid Hill, and was luxuriating 
. in his wonted batli, with Kousseau's Confessions 
in his hands, for his mental sustenance. 

But I proceed with these hasty notices of our 
city in these earlier times, about the period when 
the organization and establishment of the Histori- 
cal Society were contemplated, and about to be 
incorporated by legislative wisdom. 

Our City Library was now in possession of its 
new structure in Nassau street, and justly boasted 
, of its rare and valuable treasures, its local docu- 
ments of importance, and its learned librarian, 
John Forbes. Kent's Hotel, on Broad street, was 
the great rendezvous for heroic discussions on law 
and government, and for political and other meet- 
ings ; and here the great Hamilton was at times 
the oracle of the evening. The City H^tel, near 
old Trinity, was the chosen place for the Graces ; 
here Terpsichore presided, with her smiling coun- 
tenance, and Euterpe first patronized Italian mu- 
sic in this country, under the accomplished disci- 
pline of Trazzata. This long known and am^^le 
hall is not to be forgotten as the first building in 
this city, if not in this country, in which slate 
was used as a roof-covering, about the year 1800, 
thus supplanting the old Dutch tile of the Hol- 
landers, in use from the beginning of their dynas- 
ty among us. 

Our museums were limited to the one kept by 



20 HISTOEICAL DISCOURSE. 

old Gardener Baker, himself and kis collection a 
sort of curiosity shop, composed of heterogeneous 
fragments of the several kingdoms of nature. 
Hither childish ignorance was sometimes lost in 
wonder, and here too was the philosopher occa- 
sionally enhghtened. Scudder did not lay the 
foundation of his patriotic enterprise until five 
years after our incorporation, and although his be- 
ginning was but an humble demonstration, he 
astounded the natives with his vast tortoise, and 
Alexander Wilson, the ornithologist, gave him 
cheering counsel, and enkindled his zeal. Our 
famous Vauxhall Garden of these earlier days 
occupied the wide domain of the Bayards, situated 
on the left of our then Bunker Hill, near Bullock 
now Broome street, and here the Osage Indians, 
amidst fireworks of dazzling efficacy, (for we had 
not the use of calium or strontium in these artis- 
tic displays in those days,) yelled the war-whoop 
and danced the war-dance, while our learned Dr. 
MitchiU, often present on these occasions, trans- 
lated their songs for the advancement of Indian 
literature, and enriched the journals with ethno- 
logical science concerning our primitive inhab- 
itants. 

The Indian Queen and Tyler's were gardens of 
much resort, situated toward the Greenwich side 
of our city : at the former military evolutions 
were often displayed to the satisfaction of the 



kip's fakm. 21 

famous French general, Moreau, with Generals 
Stevens and Morton among the staff as official 
inspectors, while Tyler's is still held in remem- 
brance, by some few surviving graduates of Co- 
lumbia College, as the resort for commencement 
suppers. I shall advert to only one other site, 
which, though in days gone by not a public gar- 
den, was a place much frequented. On the old 
road towards Kingsbridge, on the eastern side of 
the island, was the well-known Kip's Farm, pre- 
eminently distinguished for its grateful fruits, the 
plum, the peach, the pear, and the apple, and for 
its choice culture of the rosacece. Here the elite 
often repaired, as did good old Dr. Johnson and 
Boswell for recreation at Eanelagh ; and here our 
Washington, now invested with presidential hon- 
ors, made an excursion, and was presented with 
the Rosa Galhca, an exotic first introduced into 
this country in this garden ; fit emblem of that 
memorable union of France and the American 
colonies in the cause of republican freedom. These 
three gardens were famous for their exquisite fruit, 
the plum and the peach ; equally as were Newtown 
and Blackwell's Island for the apple, known to all 
horticulturists, abroad and at home, as the New- 
town pippin. Such things were. No traces are 
now to be found of the scenes of those once grati- 
fjing sights ; the havoc of progressive improve- 
ment has left nought of these once fertile gardens 



22 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

of Dutch regularity, save tlie old pear tree of the 
farm of the redoubtable Peter Stuyvesant, well 
known as still flourishing in foliage and in fruit, 
in its 220th year, at the corner of Thirteenth 
street and Third Avenue. If tradition be true, 
the biographer of this venerable tree, in his ac- 
count, in the London Horticultural Transactions, 
ought not to have omitted the curious fact, that 
of its importation from Southern Europe, and of 
its having once occupied the old fort held by 
Stuyvesant and delineated by Yander Donck. If 
all this be authentic, the old pear tree enhances 
our admiration as the last living thing in exist- 
ence since the time of the Dutch dynasty. 

Order demands that our first notice of the most 
striking of our ornamental grounds should be an 
account of the Battery, and its historical associate, 
White Hall. Few, perhaps, are well informed of 
the origin of that well-recorded name, and long-lived 
historical location. John Moore, the last on the list 
of the members of the " Social Club," died in New 
York in 1828, in his 84th year. He was a grandson 
of Colonel John Moore, who was an eminent mer- 
chant of this city, and one of the Aldermen, 
when it was a great distinction to possess that 
honor : he was also a member of his Majesty's 
Provincial Council at the time of his death in 
1749. The Colonel resided at the corner of Moore 
(so called after his demise by the corporation) and 



WHITE HALL. — BOWLING GREEN. 23 

Front streets, in the largest and most costly house 
in this city at that time, and called '' White 
Hall " from its color, and which gave the name 
afterwards to the neighboring street. It is scarcely 
necessary to add, that . this great edifice was de- 
stroyed by the fire which laid waste the city in 
September, 1776, three days after the British ob- 
tained possession of it. Of the Bay and harbor, 
and of the Battery itself, I need say nothing after 
the successful description of Mrs. Trollope, and 
many other writers. The first time I entered that 
charming place, was on the occasion of the funeral 
of General Washington. The procession gathered 
there and about the Bowling Green : the Battery 
was profusely set out with the Lombardy poplar 
trees : indeed, in 1800-4 and '5, they infested 
the whole island, if not most of the middle, 
northern, and many southern States. Their in- 
troduction was curious. The elder Michaux, 
under the direction of Louis XVI., had been sent 
to America, from the Garden of Plants of Paris : he 
brought out with him the gardener, Paul Saunier, 
who possessed, shortly after, horticultural grounds 
of some extent in New Jersey. The Lombardy 
tree promised every thing good, and Paul spread 
it. It was pronounced an exotic of priceless 
value ; but like many things of an exotic nature, 
it polluted the soil, vitiated our own more stately 
and valuable indigenous products : and at length 



24 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

we find that American sagacity has proscribed its 
growth, and is daily eradicating it as uncongenial 
and detrimental to the native riches of American 
husbandry. 

In glancing at other beautiful plots, if I am 
controlled by the definition of the dictionary, I 
must omit special mention of that once famous 
spot of ground called the Park, situated in front 
of our City Hall, inasmuch as artistic taste and 
corporation sacrilege caused the cutting down of 
the more conspicuous and beautiful trees, the syca- 
mores, the maple, the walnut, and the Babylo- 
nian willows of the growth of ages, which consti- 
tuted its woodland, in order to favor the populace 
with an improved view of the architectural front 
of our then recently erected marble edifice. In 
its actual condition (lucus non lucendo) it were 
too latitudinarian to speak of the Old Commons 
as a park, at the present day. Yet the Liberty 
Boys have perpetuated it in our early history, and 
Clinton's Canal has given it a modern glorifica- 
tion, by the far-famed meeting of the tens of 
thousands opposed to the madness of party strife, 
at which the venerable Colonel Few presided, 
aided by John Pintard as secretary, to enter their 
protest against the unhallowed legislative pro- 
scription in 1824. 

At the period to which our associations are 
mainly confined, Washington Square, which a wise 



potter's field. 25 

forethouglit of our city fathers some time since 
converted into an eligible park, was not then con- 
templated. It is known to you all to have been 
our Golgotha during the dreadful visitations of the 
Yellow Fever in 1797, 1798, 1801, and 1803, and 
many a victim of the pestilence, of prominent 
celebrity, was consigned to that final resting-place 
on earth, regardless of his massive gains, or his 
public services. I shall only specify one individ- 
ual whose humble tombstone was the last of the 
sepulchral ornaments removed thence : I allude to^ 
Dr. Benjamin Perkins, the inventor of the metal- 1 
lie tractors, a charlatan, whose mesmeric delu- j 
sions, like clairvoyance in these our own days, had \ 
something of a popular recognition, and whose \ 
confidence and temerity in the treatment of his \ 
case, yellow fever, by his own specific, terminated 
in his death, after three days' illness. Not many 
years had elapsed, after the formation of this ex- 
tensive park, ere its adjacent grounds were en- 
riched by the erection of that prominent marble 
edifice, the New York University, through the 
liberality of the friends of learning, and the instru- 
mentality of the Kev. Dr. James M. Matthews, 
subsequently created its first Chancellor. St. 
John's Park, now richly entitled to that designa- 
tion from the philosophy of the vegetable econo- 
my which was evinced at its laying-out, in the 
selection, association, and distribution of its trees, 
2 



26 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

by the late Louis Simond, the distinguished trav- 
eller and artist, (for the vegetable as well as the 
animal kingdom has its adjuvants, its loves, and 
its hatreds,) had no existence at the time to which 
we more directly refer, the period of our incorpo- 
ration. If a botanical inquirer should investigate 
the variety of trees which flourish in the St. 
John's Park, he would most likely find a greater 
number than on any other ground, of equal size, 
in the known world. 

If what everybody says be true, then is Sam- 
uel B. Kuggles entitled to the meed of approba- 
tion from every inhabitant of this metropoHs, for 
the advantageous disposition of the Union Place 
Park, and its adjacent neighborhood. It was the 
lot of this enterprising citizen to manifest an en- 
larged forecast during his public career in mu- 
nicipal, equally effective as he had evinced in 
state affairs. How well grounded this assertion is, 
can easily be comprehended by any one who reads 
the public document on this great subject. The 
forethought and capacity of Mr. Kuggles are mani- 
fested throughout. All his measures on the various 
movements from time to time recommended even 
by most intelligent individuals, and his prophetic 
declarations on the enlargement of the canal, and 
the early and convenient completion of the great 
work, may be cited as characteristic of a strong 
and comprehensive intelligence. The State has 



EUGGLES. UNION PLACE. 27 

indeed at times been disfigured by tbe prejudices 
and mental inaptitudes of such governors as Yates 
and Bouck, but the period is at hand, under the 
administration of Governor King, when the canal 
boat of two hundred and twenty tons will find a 
practical navigation through the whole range of 
this mighty channel, in place of the eighty and 
ninety ton boats, accommodated to the capacity of 
the original work. The memorable vessel in 
which Columbus discovered America, was only of 
one hundred and ten tons burden.* 

The equestrian statue of Washington, exe- 
cuted with artistic ability by Brown, and erected 
in this square through the patriotic efi'orts of Col. 
Lee, aided by our Hberal merchants, adds grace to 
the beauty of that open thoroughfare of the city. 
There is a story on this subject, which, I hope, 
will find embodiment in some future edition of 
Joe Miller. Colonel Lee had assiduously collected 
a subscription for this successful statue ; among 
others, towards the close of his labors, he honored 

* See the Progress of the city of Xew York for the last fifty 
years: a Lecture delivered before the Mechanics' Society, by 
Charles King, LL.D., President of Columbia College. Among 
other most interesting matters, it contains a noble tribute to the 
large and sagacious views of Mr. Kuggles and his enhghtened 
patriotism. The commercial metropolis of the Union can never 
forget those master minds who have so effectively promoted her 
great scheme of internal improvement : their names are ever to 
be cherished as household words. 



28 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

an affluent citizen of the neighborhood, by an 
application for aid in the goodly design. " There 
is no need of the statue/' exclaimed the votary of 
wealth ; " Washington needs no statue ; he lives 
* in the hearts of his countrymen ; that is his 
statue." '• Ah ! indeed," replied the colonel, 
" does he live in yours ? " " Truly, he does," was 
the reply. " Then," added the colonel, ^' I am 
sorry, very sorry, that he occupies so mean a tene- 
ment." 

I trust I am not vulnerable to the charge of 
diverging too far from an even path, into every 
field that may skirt the road, if, while on the sub- 
ject of Gardens and Parks, I commemorate one 
other of superior claims to consideration, and 
which at the time we have so often alluded to, had 
arrived to a degree of importance which might 
almost be called national ; I mean the Elgin Bo- 
tanic Garden, founded by the late Dr. David 
Hosack, in 1801, and at the period of our incor- 
poration, justly pronounced an object of deep in- 
terest to the cultivators of natural knowledge, and 
to the curious in vegetable science. Those twenty 
acres of culture, more or less, were a triumph of 
individual zeal, ambition, and liberality, of which 
our citizens had reason to be proud, whether they 
deemed the garden as conservative of our indige- 
nous botany, or as a repository of the most pre- 
cious exotics. The eminent projector of this dis- 



ELGIN BOTANIC GARDEN. 29 

tinguislied garden, with a princely munificence, 
had made these grounds a resort for the admirers 
of nature's vegetable wonders, and for the stu- 
dents of her mysteries. Here were associated, in 
appropriate soil, exposed to the native elements, 
or protected by the conservatory and the hot- 
house, examples of vegetable hfe, and of variety 
of development — a collection that might have 
captivated a Linnaeus, or a Jussieu ; and here, 
indeed, a Michaux, and a Barton, a Mitchill, a 
Doughty, a Pursh, a Wilson, or a Le Conte, often 
repaired to solve the doubts of the cryptogamist, 
or to confirm the nuptial theory of Yaillant.* 

* Several of these distinguished disciples of the school of wis- 
dom have already found judicious biographers, who have recorded 
their services in the fields of natural knowledge. We still want 
the pen to describe the labors of Pursh, the author of the Flora 
Americae Septentrionalis. His adventurous spirit, his hazardous 
daring, and his indomitable energy, present an example of what a 
devotee in an attached calling will encounter. He was for several 
years the curator of the Elgin Botanic Garden, and widely travelled 
through the United States. Lambert, the author of the " Ameri- 
can Pines," afforded him great aid in the production of his vol- 
umes, and cherished, as I personally know, great regard for the 
benefits Pursh had conferred on American botany. Michaux has 
been more fortunate. The biographical memoir of this most emi- 
nent man, recently given to the public in the " Transactions of the 
American Philosophical Society," by Elias Durand, of Philadel- 
phia, himself a lover of botanical science, is a most grateful tribute 
to the character and merits of this intrepid explorer of the Ameri- 
can soil. Michaux was the only child of Andre Michaux, rendered 
no less famous by his " Oaks of Xorth America," and by his "Flo- 
ra," than the son by his " Forest Trees." Young Michaux, under 



30 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Here the learned Hosack, then Professor of 
Botany in Columbia College, gave illustrations to 
his medical class, and to many not exactly within 
the circle of professional life, of the natural and 
artificial systems of nature. I shall never forget 
those earlier days of my juvenile studies, when the 
loves and habits of plants and of trees were first 
expounded by that lucid instructor, and with what 
increased delight the treasures of the Jardin des 
Plantes of Paris, just arrived, through the kind- 
ness of Monsieur Thouin, were added to the great 
collection of exotics in this New York Garden. 
It was a general rule with that able instructor, to 
terminate his spring course by a strawberry festi- 

parental guidance, was early initiated into the cultivation of bo- 
tanical pursuits ; the story of his life, as given us by Mr. Durand, 
enhances our esteem of his heroic labors, and posterity must ever 
thank this enlightened biographer for the exposition he has made 
of the contributions to physical knowledge, and especially to ar- 
boriculture, which the instrumentality of Michaux has effected. 
He lived a long life, notwithstanding his innumerable perils, dying 
so late as ia October, 1855, at the age of 85 years. Every Ameri- 
can who visits the Garden of Plants of Paris, must be struck with 
the number and the richness of the American Forest Trees which 
flourish therein ; they furnish but one of many examples of the 
practical zeal and services of the Michauxs, father and son. It is 
to be hoped that, ere long, some competent botanist will favor us 
with an account of the amiable Douglass, whose tragical end is 
still involved in obscurity. We know little of him save that our 
botanical catalogue is enriched with the "Pinus Douglassii." 
Greater merits, and more modesty, were never blended in one 
individual. 



DAVID HOSACK. 31 

val. " I must let the class see," said the teacher, 
" that we are practical as well as theoretical : the 
fragaria is a most appropriate aliment : Linnseiis 
cured his gout and protracted his life by strawber- 
ries." " They are a dear article," I observed, " to 
gratify the appetite of so many." " Yes, indeed," 
he rejoined, " but in due time, from our present 
method of culture, they will become abundant and 
cheap. The disciples of the illustrious Swede 
must have a foretaste of them, if they cost me a 
dollar a piece." 

Had Dr. Hosack done no more by his efforts 
at the Elgin Garden, than awaken increased de- 
sires in the breast of his pupil Torrey for natural 
knowledge, he might be acknowledged a public 
benefactor, from the subsequent brilliant career 
which that eminent naturahst, with Professor 
Gray, has pursued in the vast domain of botanical 
inquiry. But I am happy to add, with that social 
impulse which seems to be implanted in the breast 
of every student of nature, which the frosts of 
eighty-eight winters had not chilled in Antoine L. 
Jussieu, and which glowed with equal benignity 
in the bosom of the intrepid Ledyard, on Afric's 
sandy plains, and in the very heart of the adven- 
turous Kane amidst the icy poles, Hosack is not 
forgotten. Willdenow tells us, that the crowning 
glory of the botanist is to be designated by some 
plant bearing his name. Since the death of Dr. 



32 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Hosack, the botanical nomenclature enrolls no less 
than sixteen species of plants of different regions 
under the genus Hosackia. Time and circum- 
stances have wrought great changes in this once 
celebrated place, the Elgin Grarden. 

Pleasing as might be the theme, I can only 
make a brief allusion to one other spot, which has 
peculiar claims to notice, derived from many cir- 
cumstances. I mean the Grange, once occupied 
as the seat or country residence of the lamented 
Hamilton, and now belonging to the property of 
the late W. G. Ward, a name of revolutionary re- 
nown. This beautiful retreat is about eight miles 
from the city, and some one or two miles from 
Manhattanville, on high ground, and commanding 
a view both of the East and North rivers. It is 
especially to be noted as remaining little or in no 
wise altered from the condition in which it was 
held by the patriotic soldier and statesman : it 
has been ke]3t in wholesome preservation for half 
a century, and still remains unmolested by the 
spirit of improvement. The thirteen gum trees, 
with their characteristic star leaf, forming a beau- 
tiful coppice, still stand before the door of the 
mansion, as originally planted by Hamilton him- 
self, in token of the union and per]3etuity of the 
original thirteen States of the American republic, 
— an association deeply fixed in the heart of the 
exalted patriot. On these grounds were often 



COLUMBIA COLLEGE. 33 

seen, in his latter days, in his morning and eve- 
ning wanderings, the celebrated ornithologist, Au- 
dubon, whose zeal in natural history and rural 
affairs abated not a jot in his extremes t age and 
feebleness. 

Colimibia College, that venerable and venera- 
ted seat of classical learning, was justly proud of 
her healthy and beautiful locahty, laved almost up 
to the borders of her foundation by the flowing 
streams of the Hudson, and ornamented by those 
majestic sycamores planted by the Crugers, the 
Murrays, and the Jays, fifty years before our in- 
corporation, but which city progress has recently 
so agonizingly rooted out. Well might Cowen, in 
his Tractate on Education, have extolled this once 
delectable spot as an appropriate seat for intellec- 
tual culture in the New World. 

As a graduate for nearly half a century, an 
overweening diffidence must not withhold from me 
the trespass of a moment concerning my Alma 
Mater. The faculty, when I entered within its 
walls, was the same as occupied them when our 
Historical Society was organized, and on a former 
occasion, at one of your anniversaries, I bore tes- 
timony to the cordial support which that body 
gave to our institution at its inception. The be- 
nignant Bishop Moore was its president ; Dr. 
Kemp, a strong mathematician, ably filled several 
departments of science ; impulsive and domineer- 



34 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

ing in liis nature, there were moments with him 
when a latent benevolence towards the student 
quickened itself, and he may he pronounced to 
have been an effective teacher. It has been pro- 
mulgated that he gave early hints of the practica- 
bility of the formation of the Erie Canal. I have 
never seen satisfactory proofs of such forethought 
in any of his disquisitions. He died shortly after 
that great measure was agitated : he might have 
conversed on the subject with Clinton, Morris, 
Eddy, Colles, and Fulton. . Yet I think I might, 
with perhaps equal propriety, because I had an 
interview with old William Herschel, fancy myself 
a discoverer of the nature of the milky way. 
Kemp was clever in his assigned duties, but had 
little ambition to tract beyond it. He was devoid 
of genius, and lacked enterprise. 

Dr. Bowden, as the Professor of Moral Philos- 
ophy, was a courteous gentleman, a refined scholar, 
and a belles-lettres writer. Like many others of 
a similar type, his controversial pen carried pun- 
gency with its ink, while in personal contact with 
his opponents, his cautious and modulated utter- 
ance neither ruffled the temper nor invoked vehe- 
mence in reply. Professor McYickar, so long his 
successor, has given the life and character of this 
excellent man with graphic accuracy, and our late 
departed and much lamented associate, Ogden 
Hoffman, has furnished a portrait of his virtues in 



PETER WILSON. 35 

an occasional address with the fidelity and attrac- 
tiveness of the limner's art. 

Our Professor of the Greek and Latin tongues, 
was the late Dr. Wilson : he enjoyed through a 
long life the reputation of a scholar ; he was a 
devoted man to his calling, and a reader of wide 
extent. His earnestness in imparting knowledge 
was unabated through . a long career, and had his 
intellectual texture been more plastic, he had 
proved himself to his scholars a triumphant ex- 
positor. He seemed to want the discipline of a 
more refined and general scholarship ; at times 
harassed in his classical exegesis, he became the 
veriest pedagogue, and his derivative theory and 
verbal criticism, were often provocatives of the 
loudest laughter. The sublimity of Longinus was 
beyond his grasp, and he only betrayed his hardi- 
hood when he attempted to unfold the beauties of 
the Sapphic Ode. He was enamored of Josephus 
and the history of the Jews, and recreated in the 
narrative of that ancient people of Israel ; so 
much so as to enter with warmth into measures the 
better to secure their spiritual salvation ; and if 
the newspapers, often our best authority, are to be 
relied on, associated himself with a Society for 
the Conversion of the Israelites ; and it is af&rmed, 
he secured, after years of effort, one at least, with- 
in the sheepfold of Calvinistic divinity. Dr. Wil- 
son, though cramped with dactyls and spondees. 



36 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

was generous in his nature, of kindly feelings, and 
of great forbearance towards his pupils. Few of 
our American colleges have enjoyed the blessings 
of so earnest a teacher for so long a term of years ; 
and the occurrence is still rarer, that so conscien- 
tious a professor has been followed by a successor 
of at least equal zeal in his classical department, 
and who is still further enriched with the products 
of advanced philology and critical taste.* 

Columbia College has seen her centurial course. 
While I feel that that noticeable asterisk prefixed 
to the names of her departed sons will ere long 
mark my own, I cannot but recognize the renown 
she has acquired from the men of thought and 
action whom she has sent forth to enrich the na- 
tion. Let us award her the highest praises for the 
past, while we indulge the fondest hopes for the 
future, and a great future lies before her. The 
eminent men who have successively presided over 
her government, from her first Johnson to her 
present distinguished head. Dr. King, have uni- 
formly enforced with a fixed determination, clas- 
sical and mathematical acquisitions, without 
which a retrograde movement in intellectual disci- 
pline and in practical pursuits must take place. 
While I accede to this indubitable truth, I may 
prove skeptical of the often repeated assertion of 

* Charles Anthon, LL.D. 



COLUMBIA COLLEGE. 37 

my old master, Wilson, that without tlie classics 
you can neither roast a potato nor fly a kite. It 
is currently reported that the fiscal powers of Co- 
lumbia College are more commanding than ever ; 
hence the duty becomes imperative, to enlarge her 
portals of wisdom in obedience to the spirit of the 
age. Let her proclaim and confirm the riches of 
classic lore ; let its culture, by her example, be- 
come more and more prevalent. Her statutes as- 
sure us she spreads a noble banquet for her guests ; 
but, disclaiming the monitorial, let her bear in 
mind the sanitory precept of the dietetist, that 
variety of aliment is imperative for the full devel- 
opment of the normal condition. The apician 
dishes of the ancients did not always prove condi- 
mental,* and the rising glory of an independent 
people, not yet of her own age, has need of, and 
seeks relief in, the acquisition of new pursuits, 
and in the exercise of new thoughts corresponding 
with the novelty of their condition and the wants 
of the republic. 

I had written thus much concerning my ven- 
erable Alma Mater, and was content to leave her 
in the enjoyment of that repose, if so she desired, 
which revolving years had not disturbed, when lo ! 
popular report and the public journals announce 
that new Hfe has entered into her constitution. 
The lethargy which so long oppressed her, she has 
thrown off ; she has found relief in the quickened 



38 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

spirit of the times, and in tlie doings of those in- 
tellectual bodies which surround her, and which 
modern science has called into being. Let me, an 
humble individual, venture to give her the assur- 
ances of a mighty population, in whose midst she 
stands, that the learned and the enlightened, the 
honest and the true, of every quarter, hail her ad- 
vent in unmeasured accents of praise. In the 
moral, in the scholastic, in the scientific world, her 
friends rise up to greet her with warmest approba- 
tion ; there are already manifested throughout the 
land outward and visible signs of joy at her late 
movements, and her alumni everywhere cherish an 
inward and genuine rejoicing at anticipated bene- 
fits. She has found out by the best of teachers, 
experience, that apathy yields not nutrition ; that 
there is a conservatism which is more liable to de- 
stroy than to protect. From Aristotle down to 
the present time, the schoolmen have affirmed 
that laughter is the property of reason, while the 
excess of it has been considered as the mark of 
folly. It needs no cart team to draw the parallel. 
Liberated by the increased wisdom of the age, she 
now comes forth in new proportions, and puts on 
the habiliments of one conscious that her armor is 
fitted for the strongest contest, and ready to enter 
the field of competition with the most heroic of 
her compeers. The desire on all sides to extend 
the empire of knowledge, opens the widest area 



COLUMBIA COLLEGE. 39 

for her operations, and that great educational test, 
sound, practical, and available instruction, we feel 
assured lier richly endowed board of professors 
fully comprehend, the better to rear up the moral 
and intellectual greatness of the American nation. 

More than two centuries ago, Milton, in strong 
accents, told the world, in his tractate on educa- 
tion, when referring to the physical sciences, that 
" the linguist, who should pride himself to have 
all the tongues that Babel cleft the world into, yet 
if he have not studied the solid things in them as 
well as the words and lexicons, he were nothing so 
much to be esteemed a learned man, as any yeo- 
man or tradesman completely wise in his mother's 
dialect/' Yet ages have rolled on since this orac- 
ular declaration, while the monition of this great 
scholar has passed by unheeded. But Oxford now 
knows that languages alone will not save her, 
though aided by Aristotle, and Cambridge has 
found that more than the calculus is demanded at 
her hands. 

I have repeatedly listened to the verbal re- 
marks of those two illustrious graduates of old 
Columbia, Gouverneur Morris and De Witt Clin- 
ton, on the subjects most important in a course of 
collegiate instruction for the youth of this country. 
Morris urged, with his full, flowing periods, the 
statesman's science, government and the American 
constitution ; Clinton was tenacious of the physi- 



40 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

cal and mechanical sciences : botli concurred in 
opinion that a professorship of cookery was indis- 
pensable to secure health and longevity to the 
people. But these philosophers had only recently 
returned from their exploratory tour to the West, 
as canal commissioners, to decide upon the route 
for the Erie Canal, and, though at times enHvened 
by the society of Jemima Wilkinson, must, as I 
conjecture, have fared indifferently at that period 
in their journey through that almost untrodden 
wilderness. 

From the period when the Abb6 Haiiy unfold- 
ed the theory of crystallography, we may date 
the introduction, in a liberal way, of the physical 
branches of science in academies and universities ; 
and with the chart of Bacon's outlines ever before 
us, the mighty fact of Milton is best understood, 
that acquaintance with things around us will best 
enable us to comprehend things above us ; thus 
studying the visible, the better to learn and ad- 
mire the invisible. What, then, is to be the na- 
ture of the intellectual repast a collegiate system 
is to set before its scholars, seeing great diversity 
of sentiment prevails ? The spirit of the times 
declares it, and a vast and rising republic demands 
it. Let the classics be not shorn of their proper 
dimensions, and in the discipline of her Anthon 
and her Drisler, they will neither lose symmetry, 
nor become amorphous. Let geometry and her 



COLUMBIA COLLEGE. 41 

kindred branches prefer her claims to considera- 
tion by her erudite Hackley, and her adjunct, the 
renowned Davies, of West Point celebrity : let 
natural philosophy and that science which seems 
to inosculate with almost every other, chemistry, 
be developed in all their relations, by those ardent 
disciples, McCulloh and Joy : let that adept in 
teaching, her recently elected Leiber, expound 
constitutional law and pubhc and private rights ; 
and while God and nature have established an 
eternal difference betw^een things profane and 
things holy, let the fountain be ever open from 
which flows that wisdom imparted by your vener- 
able instructor, McVickar, for the benefit of in- 
genuous youth in all after life. 

In the range of human pursuits, there is no 
avocation so grateful to the feelings as that of un- 
folding wisdom to generous and susceptible youth : ' 
philosophy to the mind is as assuredly nutriment 
to the soul, as poison must prove baneful to the 
animal functions. Whatever may be the toil of 
the instructor, who can calculate his returns .^ In 
the exercise of his great prerogative, he is deco- 
rating the temple of the immortal mind ; he is re- 
fining the affections of the human heart. Old 
Columbia, with her fiscal powers, adequate to 
every emergency, with the rich experience of a 
century, with the proud roU of eminent sons 
whom she has reared, and who have exerted an 



42 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

influence on the literature and destinies of the 
commonwealth ; these, without the enumeration 
of other concurring circumstances, are enough to 
encourage comprehensive views of blessings in 
store : and that heart and head will co-operate 
effectively in the reformation of abuses which time 
had almost made venerable, and delight in the 
glorious undertaking, fortified in the councils of a 
benignant Providence, of rearing to full stature a 
University commensurate with the enlarged poli- 
cy that characterizes New York, is the prayer of 
this generation, and cannot fail to be of the 
future, to whom its perpetuity is bequeathed. 

There are few of my auditory who have not 
been struck with the increase, both in numbers 
and in architectural display, of our ecclesiastical 
edifices. When this Society was an applicant for 
incorporation, the Koman Catholic denomination 
had one place of worship, situated in Barclay 
street, and organized in 1786 : they now have 
thirty-nine. The Jews of the Portuguese order, 
the victims of early intolerance by the inquisition 
of Portugal, and who first came among us prior to 
the time of old Gov. Stuyvesant, had but one 
synagogue for upwards of a century : they now, 
with the Germans, have eighteen. The Epis- 
copal denomination had seven churches, they now 
have forty-nine. The Baptists had three, they 
now boast thirty. But I can proceed no further 



JOHN PINTARD. CHURCHES. 43 

in these details. When I published an account of 
New York and its institutions in 1832,* we had 
one hundred and twenty-three places of public 
worship : our aggregate at this time approaches 
three hundred, of which we may state that sixty 
are of the Dutch Reformed and Presbyterian de- 
nominations, and forty of the Methodists. As I 
dismiss the churches, I am also compelled to omit 
almost aU notice of the departed worthies of the 
various denominations with whom I have been 
personally acquainted, or heard as pastors of their 
several flocks. Our worthy founder, John Pintard, 
was extremely solicitous that we should give 
minute attention to the American church, and 
preserve faithful records of her progress. Had we 
labored severely in this species of inquiry, we might 
have had much to do, and I fear have proved dere- 
lict in many things, which, as a Historical Society, 
called louder on our time, and for our devotion. 

Early instruction and reading while a boy, 
gave me something of a bias towards matters 
pertaining to churches and their pastors : my 
repeated visits to my father's grave, in Ann street, 
when I was not yet seven years old, led me to 
church yards and to epitaphs, and I had collected, 
when scarcely able to pen an intelligible hand, 
quite a volume of those expressive memorials of 

* Brewster's Edinburgh Encyclopaedia. 



44 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

saddest bereavement. I state these facts, lest in 
what I have to say, in a brief notice of a few of 
the earlier clerical worthies of this city, you might 
apprehend, from my personal reminiscences, that I 
was half a century older than I actually am. 

Christopher C. Kunze was the first clergyman 
I ever cast eyes upon. He was of the Evangeli- 
cal German Lutheran Church. He officiated in 
the old stone edifice corner of Frankfort and Wil- 
liam streets ; he was the successor of Muhlen- 
burg, who afterwards was the president of the 
convention that ratified the Constitution, and 
speaker of the House of Kepresentatives. His 
political career is rendered memorable by his cast- 
ing vote in behalf of Jay's treaty. As little is 
said of Kunze in the books, I may state, that he 
was a native of Saxony, was born in 1744, edu- 
cated at the Halle Orphan House, and studied 
theology at the University of that city. Thence 
he was called in 1771 to the service of the Lu- 
theran churches St. Michael and Zion's in Phila- 
delphia. In 1784 he accepted a call from the 
Evangelical Lutheran church in William, corner 
of Frankfort street, as stated. Here he officiated 
until his death in 1807. He held the professor- 
ship of Oriental Languages in Columbia College, 
from 1784 to 1787, and from 1792 'to 1795. 
While Kunze occupied his ecclesiastical trust, a 
struggle arose to do away the German and substi- 



C. C. KUNZE. 45 

tute the English language in preaching. With 
assistance. Dr. Kunze prepared a collection of 
Hymns, translated into English : they were the 
most singular specimens of couplets and triplets I 
ever perused, yet they possessed much of the in- 
tensity and spiritualism of German poetry. This 
was in the fall of 1795. '•'■ Dr. Kunze was a 
scholar somewhat after the order of old Dr Styles, 
and deeply verseU in the fathers, in theology. He 
was so abstracted from worldly concerns and the 
living manners of the times, that like Jackey 
Barrett, of Trinity College, Dublin, he practically 
scarcely knew a sheep from a goat, though he 
might have quoted to your satisfaction Virgil and 
TibuUus. He reared the moral and intellectual 
structure of Henry Stuber, who wrote the contin- 
uance of the life of Franklin, and who then sunk 
into the grave by an insidious consumption. 
Kunze was versed in astroliomy, and was some- 
thing of an astrologer. He was quite skilled in 
numismatics, and you can appreciate the value of 
the rich collection of medals and coins which his 
family placed at the disposal of our Society. 
Kunze died fifty years ago, and in his death we 
lost one of our great scholars, and a worthy man. 
He held a newspaper controversy on the Grego- 
rian period of the century 1800, and published a 

* Published by Hurtin & Commardiuger. New York : John 
Tiebout: 12ino, 1795. 



46 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Sermon entitled " King Solomon's great sacfrifice/* 
delivered at the dedication of the English Lu- 
theran Zion Church, October 4, 1801. It demon- 
strates his command of the English language. 

There is associated with this movement of the 
Enghsh Hymn Book for the Lutheran Church, a 
transaction which can hardly be overlooked. It is 
connected with our Hterary history. The growth 
of our native population, after the war, produced 
an increased demand for tuition as weU as for 
preaching in the English tongue ; and while the 
Lutheran Catechism found a translator in the 
Kev. George Strebeck, and Luther's black-letter 
Bible yielded to James's, (the English,) the Ger- 
man Theatre, with Kotzebue at its head, was now 
beginning to find among us readers, and actors in 
an English dress ; and William Dunlap, and 
Charles Smith, a bookseller in Pearl street, (after- 
wards better known for his invaluable Military 
Kepository, on the American Kevolution,) and the 
Rev. H. P. Will,* furnished materials for the act- 
ing drama from this German source, for the John 
street Theatre ; so that in New York we had a 
foretaste of Kotzebue and Schiller ere they were 
subjected to the criticism of a London audience, 

* This accomplished man, after but a short stay in New York, 
returned to Europe, where, in 1799, he published in London, in 
two volumes octavo, a Translation of Knigge's Practical Philoso- 
phy of Social Life. 



JOHANNES D. GROS. 47 

or were embodied in Thompson's translations of 
the German Theatre. 

It was just about this period^ 1795-6, that 
Dominie Johannes Daniel Gros, a preacher of the 
Reformed Dutch Church of Nassau street, (where 
Gen. North erected a beautiful mural tablet to 
Baron Steuben,) having discoursed both in the 
German and English tongues, retired from the 
field of his labors, left the city, and settled at 
Canandaigua, where he died in 1812. He had 
been a pupil of Kern, and he became the instruc- 
tor of the accomplished Milledoler. His praises 
were on every lip, and here and there is still a liv- 
ing graduate of Columbia College, who will tell 
you how, under those once ornamental button- 
woods, he drilled his collegiate class on Moral Phi- 
losophy, while the refined and classical Cochran 
(like our Anthon of these days) unfolded the 
riches of the Georgics, and Kemp labored to ex- 
cite into action his electrical apparatus. It may 
not be misplaced here to state, that it became ob- 
vious to the worshippers of this denomination of 
Christians, that the increase of the Enghsh lan- 
guage among the population induced a correspond- 
ing decline of the Dutch tongue, and that in order 
to secure the durability of the congregation of the 
North Dutch Church, it was requisite that divine 
instruction should be imparted in the now fast 
increasing popular language. Accordingly, the 



48 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

pulpit of the North Dutch Church was, in 1764, 
supplied by the Kev. Dr. Laidlie, who preached 
the first sermon in English in that church in the 
month of March of that year. The alternate use 
of the Dutch and English languages was contin- 
ued for a long while. 

There seems to have been a mutually active 
spirit among our Hollanders and their descend- 
ants, to preserve their cohesion by their early 
adoption of the English language, and the laying 
aside, but for occasional use, their native tongue, 
as well as with our German residents, in calling 
early into service the English speech, for religious 
devotion ; but the year 1764 is memorable for the 
movements of these difi'erent bodies of Christian 
worshippers in urging the importance of a stronger 
hold among the people by employing the English 
tongue in their devotional exercises. The Kev. 
Johannes M. Kern, who by the consistory of Hei- 
delberg was sent thither, arrived in New York in 
1763, when he assumed the pastoral office in the 
German Nassau street Church, which had been 
erected on the very site where the old American 
Dramatic Company a few years before held their 
theatrical performances. The surviving daughter 
of this earnest clergyman is still among us, in 
strength of mind and body, in the ninetieth year 
of her age, and preserves the records of her fath- 
er's ministry. The Christian charities which en- 



PILMORE. — ASBURY. 49 

riched these denominations, and the harmony 
which obtained among them, is demonstrated by 
the fact that Kern was installed by the ministers 
of the Collegiate Church. The Lutherans seem to 
have been the more tardy sect in seeking the ad- 
vantages of English preacliing for the benefit of 
their flock. The last of our theological wor- 
thies who used the lano:uao:e of Holland in 
the ministry, was the Kev. Dr. Gerardus Kuy- 
pers, of the Dutch Reformed Church. He died 
in 1833. But I forbear to trespass upon the 
interesting Memorial of the Dutch Church, re- 
cently published by our learned Vice-President, 
Dr. De Witt.* 

I was well acquainted with Joseph Pilmore 
and Francis Asbury : the former with Boardman, 
the first regular itinerant preachers of this coun- 
try, sent out by John Wesley : Pilmore was a 
stentorian orator. The latter, Asbury, was dele- 
gated as general superintendent of the Society's 
interest, and was afterwards denominated Bishop ; 
they were most laborious and devoted men, mighty 
travellers through the American wilds in the days 
of Oglethorpe. Pilmore finally took shelter in the 

* See that valuable record, " A Discourse delivered in the 
North Reformed Dutch Church, (Collegiate,) in the city of New 
York, on the last Sabbath in August, 1856. By Thomas De Witt, 
D. D., one of the Ministers of the Collegiate Reformed Dutch 
Church. New York, ISST. 
3 



50 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

doctrines of episcopacy. Asbury was by no means 
an uproarious preacher. A second Whitfield in 
his activity, in his locomotive faculty a sort of 
Sinbad on land : wrapt up in ample corduroy 
dress, he bid defiance to the elements, like the 
adventurous pioneer, journeying whithersoever he 
might. He had noble qualities, disinterested prin- 
ciples, and enlarged views. He has the credit, at 
an early date, of projecting the Methodist Book 
Concern, that efficient engine for the diff'usion of 
knowledge throughout the land, and second to no 
other establishment of a like nature among us 
save the Brothers Harper. No denomination has 
stronger reasons to be grateful to individual effort 
for its more enlightened condition, its increased 
strength, its literature, its more refined ministry, 
and the trophies which already adorn the brows of 
its scholars, than has the Methodist Church to 
Francis Asbury. Pilmore and Asbury were both 
advanced in life when I knew them. Pilmore 
sustained a wholesome rubicundity ; Asbury ex- 
hibited traces of great care and a fixed pallor, in 
the service of his Master. 

I will close this order of the ministry with the 
briefest notice I can take of Thomas Coke, the 
first Methodist Bishop for America consecrated by 
Wesley himself, in 1784, and identified with the 
progress of that society, both in England and in this 
country. He was just fifty years old when I lis- 



THOMAS COKE. 51 

tened to him in the summer of 1797. He was a 
diminutive creature, little higher than is reported 
to have been the pious Isaac Watts, but some- 
what more portly. He had a keen visage, which 
his aquiline nose made the more decided, yet 
with his ample wig and triangular hat he bore an 
impresssive personnel. His indomitable zeal and 
devotion were manifest to all. An Oxford scholar, 
a clever author, and glowing with devotional fer- 
vor, his shrill voice penetrated the remotest part 
of the assembly. He discoursed on God's provi- 
dence, and terminated the exercises with reading 
the beautiful hymn of Addison, " The Lord my 
pasture shall prepare." So distinctly enunciatory 
was his manner, that he almost electrified the au- 
dience. He dealt in the pathetic, and adepts in 
preaching might profit by Coke. Though sixty 
years have elapsed since that period, I have him 
before me as of yesterday. Thus much of Asbury 
and Coke, legible characters, whole-hearted men, 
the primitive pioneers of Methodism in this broad- 
cast land. 

I should hke to have dwelt upon the character 
of another great apostle of the Arminian faith, 
Thomas F. Sargeant. He was cast much after 
the same physical mould as our John M. Mason. 
He had little gesticulation, save the occasional 
raising of the palms of his hands. He stood with 
an imposing firmness in the sacred desk. A mas- 



52 HISTORICAL DISCOUESE. 

ter of intonation, Ms modulated yet strong and 
clear utterance poured forth a flood of thought 
characterized by originality and profundity on 
Christian ethics and Christian faith, winning admi- 
ration and securing conviction. He was free from 
dogmatism, and aimed to secure his main object, 
to render religion the guiding rule of life. His 
blows were well directed to break the stubborn 
heart. He was a great workman in strengthening 
the foundation of Methodism amonsf us. He filled 
with acceptance every pulpit to which he was in- 
vited, but what w^as of more importance to a needy 
and a struggling congregation in those days, he 
filled every pew : but I desist from further details. 
I introduce Bishop Provoost in this place, be- 
cause I think our Episcopal brethren have too 
much overlooked the man, his learning, his liberal- 
ity, and his patriotism. He had the bearing of a 
well-stalled Bishop, was of pleasing address, and 
of refined manners. He imbibed his first classical 
taste at King's College, and was graduated at 
Peter House, Cambridge. He became skilled in 
the Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, German, and 
Italian languages, and we have been assured he 
made an English poetical version of Tasso. I 
never listened to his sacred ministrations but once, 
in Old Trinity ; he was then advanced in years. 
He was quite a proficient in Botanical knowledge, 
and was among the earliest in England who stud- 



SAMUEL PROVOOST. 53 

ied the Linnasan classification. I Ions: agco exam- 
ined his copy of ^'' Caspar Bauhin's Historia Plan- 
tarum/'' whom, on a written leaf affixed to the first 
volume, he calls the prince of botanists, and which 
MS. bears date 1766. As Lieut. Gov. Golden was 
the first expositor of the system of Linnasus in 
the New World, and which he taught on the 
banks of the Hudson almost immediately after it 
was announced by the illustrious Swede, there can 
be little doubt that harmonious discussion on so 
novel and fertile a theme must have often engaged 
the mental powers of these distinguished disciples 
of natural knowledge. He was to the back-bone 
a friend to the cause of revolutionary America ; 
and I believe it is now granted, that there was 
scarcely another of that religious order among us 
who was not a royalist. I ought to add, that a 
portion of his library was given to our Society by 
C. D. Golden, his son-in-law, who furnished me 
with the MS. of his life, a few days before his 
death, and to which I ventured, with the approba- 
tion of Mr. Golden, to make additional facts con- 
cerning the Bishop's attainments in natural sci- 
ence. 

Our enlightened founder, John Pintard, was 
personally known, during a long life, to a large 
majority of the citizens of this metropolis, and 
was universally consulted by individuals, of almost 
every order, for information touching this State's 



54 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

transactions, and the multifarious occurrences of 
this city, which have marked its progress since our 
revolutionary struggle. Persons and things, indi- 
vidualities and corporations, literary, biographical, 
ecclesiastical, and historical circumstances, muni- 
cipal and legislative enactments, internal and ex- 
ternal commerce, all these were prominent among 
the number ; and his general accuracy as to per- 
sons and dates made him a living chronology. 
During a long period of his memorable life, our 
learned associate. Dr. Mitchill, held the same dis- 
tinction in the walks of science. Pintard's life 
was not, however, solely retrospective : he had the 
capabilities of one whose vision extended far 
ahead. Witness his remarkable estimate of the 
growth of this city, in inhabitants and in extent, 
dating from about 1805, and comprehending a 
period long after his death. ' The fulfilment is so 
striking with the facts as he prognosticated, that 
the statistical writer cannot but marvel at the 
precision of his data and the fulfilment of his cal- 
culations. See, further, his earnest co-operation 
with De Witt Clinton, Stephen Van Kensselaer, 
C. D. Golden, Thomas Eddy, K. Bowne, and others, 
in bringing together that first mass meeting in 
behalf of the Erie Policy, held in the Park, when 
the requisites for such assumption jeoparded almost 
hfe, and cut off all political advancement. Look 
at his enlarged views to promote the interests of 



JOHN PINTAKD. 55 

that church to which he so early and so long had 
claims as an exalted member, in effectually secur- 
ing the noble Sherrard bequest for the Theological 
Seminary, and his successful application to George 
Lorillard for the twenty-five thousand dollar fund 
for a professorship : canvass his merits for the 
organization of many of the libraries which now 
enrich this city, and the cheerful aid with which 
he united with the late benevolent William Wood, 
in furtherance of a hundred other public objects. 
Examine for yourselves the records of the office of 
the city inspector, and learn the obstacles he en- 
countered to establish that department of the city 
institutions, for the registry of births and deaths. 
But I will no longer tire you. 

Pintard's astonishing love and reverence for the 
past was no less remarkable. The men of the 
Revolution were his idols, and perhaps his longest 
attached and most important of this class were 
Willett, Jay, Fish, and Col. Trumbull. He often 
conversed with me of his acquaintance with Wash- 
ington, Jefferson, Madison, Geo. Clinton, Rufus 
King, and Hamilton, but I am left to infer that 
with some of these his personal associations were 
limited. As a dej)uty agent under Elias Boudi- 
not, as commissary-general for prisoners, he was 
fully conversant, from observation, with the hor- 
rors of the jail and the Jersey prison ship, and he 
never touched that subject that he did not revive 



56 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

reminiscences of Philip Freneau, the scenes of the 
old Sugar House, the hospital practice conducted 
by Michaelis and Nooth, and others, on the Amer- 
ican j)risoners in the old Dutch Church, (now 
Post Office,) then appropriated to medical accom- 
modation, as well as for other purposes, by the 
British army. It is familiarly known to my audi- 
ence that our State legislature, during the session 
of 1817-18, passed a law, prepared by the Hon. 
Henry Meigs, for the disinterment of the body of 
Montgomery in Canada, for re-burial under the 
monument in St. Paul's Church, N. Y. Soon 
after the passage of the act, I waited upon Mr. 
Pintard on some subject connected with the His- 
torical Society, and found his mind worried. 
" You seem, sir," said I, " to be embarrassed." 
" Somewhat so," replied he ; " I have just re- 
ceived an Albany letter requiring specific informa- 
tion : they are at a loss to know where Montgom- 
ery's bones lie. I shall be able soon to give them 
an answer." It is almost needless to add that 
Pintard's directions led to the very spot where, 
within a few feet designated by him, the remains 
of the patriot were discovered. 

It had long been understood that the old 
Chamber of Commerce had a fall-length portrait, 
painted by Pine, of Lieut. Governor Colden. 
Pintard was for years in search of it : at length 
he had prospects of success ; and ransacking the 



SAMUEL MILLER. 57 

loft of the old Tontine, (recently demolished,) he 
discovered the prize among a parcel of old lumber. 
^' I shall now/' said he, " take measures to revive 
that excellent old corporation, much to be regard- 
ed for what it has done for our metropolis, and for 
what it is capable of doing.'' My friend Dr. King 
can scarcely forget Dr. Pintard in his History of 
the Chamber of Commerce. This precious paint- 
ing of Colden is now among your historical 
treasures. 

If a careful examination be made of the ear- 
lier records of our Historical Society, it will be 
seen that our founder, John Pintard, filled with 
the idea of establishing this institution, most judi- 
ciously sought the countenance of the reverend 
the clergy of this metropolis. He was alive to the 
beneficial zeal employed by Jeremy Belknap and 
other divines in behalf of the Massachusetts His- 
torical Society : he considered the clergy as among 
the safest guardians of literature and history, and 
that their recommendation of the measure would 
prove of signal utility. The Eev. Dr. Samuel 
Miller, of whom I have on several occasions spo- 
ken in laudatory terms, was at this period a prom- 
inent individual throughout the land, by the re- 
cent publication of his " Brief Ketrospect," which 
obtained for its author the applause of both hem- 
ispheres. This able divine and courteous and ex- 
emplary character, had also announced to his 



58 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

friends his intention of preparing for tlie press a 
'' History of tlie State of New York," and it was 
further understood that he had given much study 
to historical research. Dr. John M. Mason, who 
stood without a parallel among us as a preacher, 
and as a student of ecclesiastical affairs, with 
strong feelings for New York, was also one on 
whom Pintard relied for counsel. There was, 
moreover, so adventurous a daring in the very ele- 
ments of Mason's constitution, and his j)ersonal 
influence was so wide among the hterati, that it 
was inferred his countenance could not but in- 
crease the number of advocates for the plan. Inno- 
vation presented no alarm to Dr. Mason : progress 
was his motto. He had heard much of revolu- 
tionary times from the lips of his friend Hamil- 
ton. His father's patriotism circulated in his 
veins : he knew the uncertainties of historical data, 
and that the nation's history, as well as that of 
the State's, was yet to be written. This heroic 
scholar and divine, whom I never think of Tvdthout 
admiration of the vastness of intellectual power 
which Grod in his wisdom vouchsafes to certain 
mortals, was prominently acknowledged as the 
chieftain of the ecclesiastical brotherhood of those 
days. He contemplated, moreover, a life of his 
friend Hamilton, and doubtless was often absorbed 
in the consideration of American history. The 
paramount obligations of his pastoral and scholas- 



JOHN M. MASON. 59 

tic duties, and their imperative urgency, must un- 
questionably be assigned as reasons for liis non- 
performance. As a reader be was unrivalled ; as 
an orator in tbe sacred desk, bis disciplined intel- 
lect sbed its radiance over all be uttered. Kicb 
in a knowledge of mankind, and of tbe etbics of 
nations, tbe ample treasures of ancient and mod- 
ern learning were summoned at command, witb a 
practical influence at wbicb doubt fled, and 
sophistry and indifference stood abashed. He was 
bold in bis animadversions on public events, and 
lashed the deformities and vices of tbe times with 
unsparing severity. There was no equivocation in 
bis nature, either in sentiment or in manner. His 
address to his people, on resigning bis pastoral 
charge of tbe Cedar street Church, is, perhaps, 
his greatest oratorical effort. An overflowing as- 
sembly were wrapt in consternation at the force of 
bis logic, bis eloquent and profound appeal, and 
the dee23 gravity of his manner, The thunders of 
Mount Sinai could scarcely be more intensely felt 
by bis devoted flock, than the words which be ut- 
tered in allusion to the Christian triumphs of his 
father's life and labors in their midst. " Here," 
exclaimed the preacher, filled witb tbe sacredness 
of his divine mission, " bere niy father prayed, 
and God heard him ; here my father preached, 
and God gave him seals of bis ministry and 
crowns of bis rejoicing. The memorial of his 



60 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

faithfiilness is perpetually before my eyes ; and in 
the spot over wliich I now stand, his flesh rests in 
hope. I have entered into his labors. The seed 
which he sowed I have been honored to water."' 
He had within him the power to annihilate equivo- 
cation, and abrogate with keenest reasoning those 
formularies which he pronounced to have oppressed 
the Church of God, and acted as a barrier to her 
progress. No preacher among us ever more earn- 
estly contended for the all-sufficiency of the Bible ; 
and with Chilling worth he was wont to exclaim, 
" The Bible is the religion of Protestants." I 
have said sufficient to demonstrate the earnestness 
of the faith cherished by Mason : on no subject 
whatever that he attempted to expound, could he 
be dull. I might say much to show that, not- 
withstanding the warmth of his temperament, he 
was often lenient. I have seen the big tear fill 
his eye when he compared the success of his labors 
with those of his excellent and intimate friend, 
Eobert Hall, whom he called a lump of goodness. 
No instance of the predominance of his benev- 
olent impulse and his kindly nature was more 
favorably illustrated than in an occurrence at which 
I was present, of a long interview of three hours 
which took place with the Doctor and the cele- 
brated Abbe Correa de Serra, the Portuguese Min- 
ister. This remarkable man, of rare genius, so 
amply stored with ancient and modern languages, 



JOHN M. MASON. 61 

and so full of a knowledge of the sciences, was in- 
terrogated by Dr. Mason on the government and 
ecclesiastical polity of the Pontifical Church. 
Armed at every point, the learned and profound 
Abbe vindicated the claims of his order and the 
wisdom of the Romish policy, in which he had 
been disciplined with the astuteness and dexterity 
of the ablest Jesuit, while the calm conversa- 
tional tone and the courteous diction which flowed 
between these two champions won the admi- 
ration of the company, and afforded the hap- 
piest proof of the benignity of intellectual cul- 
ture. The angular points of Scotch Protestant- 
ism seemed in the discussion to be somewhat 
blunted by the exposition given of the Romish 
Church, and I was led to the conclusion that a 
religion whose fundamentals were charity and love 
depended more upon the conformity of the heart 
to its saving principles, and less upon non-con- 
formity to established rituals. 

Dr. Mason's Plea for Sacramental Communion 
evinced a toleration worthy of apostolic Chris- 
tianity : his address on the formation of the Ame- 
rican Bible Society, prepared within a few hours for 
the great occasion, by its masculine vigor, crushed 
opposition even in high quarters, and led cap- 
tive the convention. " We have not a man 
among us,'' said Ohnthus Gregory, of the Brit- 
ish Society, " who can cope with your Ma- 



62 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

son. All have wondered at the sublimity and 
earnestness of his address/' In his conversation, 
Dr. Mason was an intellectual gladiator, while his 
commanding person and massive front added force 
to his argument. He knew the ductihty of words, 
and generally chose the strongest for strongest 
thoughts. He had a nomenclature which he often 
strikingly used. In reference to an individual 
whose support to a certain measure was about to 
be solicited, ^' Put no confidence in him," said the 
Doctor, ^' he's a lump of negation." In speaking 
of the calamitous state of the wicked and the 
needy in times of pestilence, he broke forth in this 
language : — " To be poor in this world, and to be 
damned in the next, is to be miserable indeed." 
He had a deep hatred of the old-fashioned pulpit, 
which he called an ecclesiastical tub, and said it 
cramped both mind and body. With Whitfield, 
he wished the mountain for a pulpit, and the 
heavens for a sounding-board. His example in in- 
troducing the platform in its stead has proved so 
effective, that he may claim the merit of having 
led to an innovation which has already become 
almost universal among us. As Dr. Mason is his- 
torical, and a portion of our Society's treasure, I 
could not be more brief concerning him. If ever 
mortal possessed decision of character, that mortal 
was John M. Mason. 

Pintard, thus aided by the co-operation of so 



EGBERT BENSON. 63 

many and worthy individuals in professional life, 
determined to prosecute bis design with vigor. 
He bad doubtless submitted bis plan to bis most 
reliable friend, De Witt Clinton, at an early day 
of its inception, and it is most probable that by 
their concurrence Judge Egbert Benson was 
selected as the most judicious choice for first Pres- 
ident. This venerable man had long been an actor 
in some of the most trying scenes of his country's 
legislative history, and was himself the subject of 
history. His antecedents were all favorable to his 
being selected : of Dutch parentage, a native of 
the city of New York, and a distinguished classi- 
cal scholar of King's College, from which he was 
graduated in 1765. He was one of the Commit- 
tee of Safety : deeply read in legal matters, and 
as a proficient in the science of pleading, he had 
long been known as holding a high rank in juris- 
prudence. By an ordinance of the Convention of 
1777, he was appointed first Attorney-General of 
the State — ^he was also a member of the first legis- 
lature the same year. Perhaps it may be new to 
some of my hearers to learn, that he was also one of 
the three Commissioners appointed by the United 
States to assist with other Commissioners, that 
might be chosen by Sir Guy Carleton, in superin- 
tending the embarkation of the tories for Nova Sco- 
tia. The letter to Carleton of their appointment, 
signed by Judge Egbert Benson, William Smith, 



64 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

and Daniel Parker, bears date New York, Juno 
17, 1783. I am indebted to our faithful histo- 
rian, Mr. Lossing, for this curious fact. 

In 1789 Mr. Benson was elected one of the six 
Kepresentatives of New York to the first Con- 
gress, in which body he continued four years. In 
his Congressional career, he was often associated in 
measures with Kufus King, Fisher Ames, Oliver 
Ellsworth, and others of the same illustrious order 
of men. Nor did his official public services end 
here. In 1794 he was appointed a Judge of the 
Supreme Court of New York, where he remained 
several years. He was a Kegent of the University 
from 1789 to 1802. He was a most intimate and 
reliable friend of that stern and inflexible patriot, 
Gov. John Jay. He lived, the admiration of all 
good men, to the very advanced age of 87 years, 
blessed with strength of body and soundness of 
mind, and died at Jamaica, on Long Island, in 
1833, confident in the triumphs of a Christian 
life. 

The patriotism of Judge Benson, his devotion 
to his country in its most trying vicissitudes, and 
his political and moral integrity, were never ques- 
tioned. His kindliness of feeling, and his social 
and unassuming demeanor, struck every beholder. 
Such was Egbert Benson, the individual earliest 
and wisely pointed out as our first President. 

My acquaintance with Judge Benson did not 



EGBERT BENSON. 65 

commence until near tlie close of his official tenure 
in this Society. He presided at the first great 
festival we held in 1809, at the delivery of Dr. Mil- 
ler's Discourse, on the 4th of September, 1809, 
designed to commemorate the discovery of New 
York, being the completion of the second century 
since that event. I have, on a former occasion, 
given an account of that celebration. Judge Ben- 
son was anecdotical in an eminent degree : his 
iron memory often gave proofs of its tenacity. 
His reminiscences of his native city are often 
evinced in his curious Eecord of New York in 
the olden times. From him I learned that our 
noble faculty of physic had, in those earlier days, 
their disputations, theoretical and practical, as we 
have witnessed them in our own times. Strong 
opposition was met in those days to the adoption 
of inoculation for the small-pox, as pursued by Dr. 
Beekman Van Beuren, in the old Alms House, 
prior to 1770. Old McGrath, a violent Scotch- 
man, who came among us about 1743, and who is 
immortalized by Smollett, had the honor of intro- 
ducing the free use of cold bathing and cold lava- 
tions in fever. He doubtless had drawn his no- 
tions from Sir John Floyer, but probably had 
never conceived a single principle enforced by Cur- 
rie. McGrath's whole life was a perpetual tur- 
moil. The venerable Judge confirmed all I had 
derived from Dr. Samuel Bard concerning Mc- 



66 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Gf-atli's captious disposition and unrefined address. 
Neither Middleton^ nor Farquhar, nor Glossy, 
could be on easy terms with him ; and these men, 
with John Jones and John Bard, shed lustre on 
the faculty of physic at that early day. Dr. 
Henry Mott, who died in 1840, aged 83 years, 
the father of the illustrious surgeon Dr. Valentine 
Mott, was among the prominent practitioners who 
adopted the mercurial practice, with Ogden and 
Muirson, of Long Island, not without much op- 
position. 

' I forbear to record at this time the pleasing 
reminiscences the Judge gave me at different 
times of the Bards — John, the best known for his 
intimacy with Franklin, and his essay on the ma- 
lignant fever of Long Island, and Samuel, his 
accomplished son, the active founder of our first 
medical school of King's College. But the most 
serious rencontre in our medical annals, according 
to the Judge, was that which took place with Dr. 
Pierre Michaux, a French refugee, who settled in 
New York about 1791, who published an English 
tract on a surgical subject, with a Latin title- 
page. The pamplilet was too insignificant to 
j)rove an advantageous advertisement to the pen- 
niless author, but Dr. Wright Post, of most dis- 
tinguished renown in our records of surgery, feel- 
ing annoyed by its appearance, solicited his 
intimate friend, the acrimonious Dunlap, the dra- 



PIERRE MICHAUX. _ 67 

matic writer, to write a caricature of the work and 
the author. The request was promptly complied 
with, and at the old John Street Theatre a ludi- 
crous after-piece was got up, illustrative of a sur- 
gical case, Fractura 3Iinimi Digiti, with a meet- 
ing of doctors in solemn consultation upon the 
catastrophe. Michaux repaired to the theatre, 
took his seat among the spectators, and found the 
representation of his person, his dress, his man- 
ner, and his speech, so fairly a veri-resemblance, 
that he was almost ready to admit an ahbi, and 
alternately thought himself now among the audi- 
ence — now among the performers. The humili- 
ated Michaux sought redress by an assault upon 
Dunlap, as, on the ensuing Sabbath, he was com- 
ing out from worship in the Brick Church. The 
violent castigation Dunlap received at the church 
j)ortal, suspended his pubhc devotional duties for 
at least a month. Michaux, now the object of 
popular ridicule, retired to Staten Island, where 
after a while his life was closed, oppressed with 
penury, and mortification of mind. • I have thus 
(by way of parenthesis) introduced some things 
touching the doctors of years past. I crave your 
clemency for the interruption. I am so constitu- 
ted, that I cannot avoid a notice of our departed 
medical men whenever I address New Yorkers on 
the subject of their city. I must plead, moreover, 
that these medical anecdotes are connected with 



68 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

the materials I derived from Judge Benson him- 
self. They in part illustrate his minute recognition 
of events and his tenacious recollection. 

So intimately connected with history is the 
record of juridical proceedings, and the actors 
thereof, the actual founders of statutory measures, 
especially in our popular form of government, that 
State events necessarily receive their distinctive 
features from the members of the bar. In short, 
is not the statute book the most faithful history of 
a people ? Mr. Pintard, with the largest views to 
success, earnestly sought the co-operation of that 
enlightened and important profession. The laws 
of a nation, said he, are pre-eminently historical 
in their nature, and fall within our scope. I am 
justified in the assertion, from personal knowledge, 
that no class of our citizens embarked with greater 
zeal in strengthening the interests of this Associa- 
tion than did the members of that faculty. If 
you search the minutes of our proceedings, you 
will find they constitute a large portion of our 
early friends, and that, too, at a period, when the 
idea of rearing this establishment was pronounced 
preposterous, by many even of the well informed. 

I shall glance at a few of these worthies among 
our earliest, our strongest, and most devoted sup- 
porters. Anthony Bleecker, who deserves an am- 
ple memoir, was a native of the city of New 
York ; he was born in October, 1770, and died in 



ANTHONY BLEECKER. 69 

March, 1827. He was a graduate of Columbia 
College, reared to the profession of the law, and 
was a gentleman of classical acquisitions, and re- 
fined belles-lettres taste. As a member of the 
Drone Club, a social and literary circle, which had 
at that time an existence of some years among us, 
and which included among its members Kent, 
Johnson, Dunlap, Edward and Samuel Miller, and 
Charles Brockden Brown, he proved an efficient 
associate in our ranks. He was for many years a 
prolific contributor to the periodical press, in ele- 
gant literature, and wrote for the Drone in prose 
and verse. Well stored in historical and topo- 
graj^hical matters, not a small portion of our 
library, which contains our early literature, was 
due to his inquisitive spirit. His sympathies were 
ever alive to acts of disinterested benevolence, and 
as proof we may state that from the crude notes, 
journals, and log-books which Capt. James Riley 
furnished, Bleecker drew up gratuitously that pop- 
alar " Narrative of the Brig Commerce," which 
obtained so wide a circulation both in this coun- 
try and abroad. He was almost unceasingly en- 
gaged in American records of a hterary nature, 
and was just such a scholar for a contributor as 
the EngHsh " Notes and Queries '' would have so- 
licited for their work. He wrote to Bisset, the 
English writer of the reign of George III., to cor- 
rect the error which he had promulgated, that 



70 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Henry Cruger, the colleague of Burke, had cir- 
cumscribed his speech to the enunciation of three 
words, " I say ditto ;" and which Bisset finally 
cancelled in subsequent reprints. The produc- 
tions of Mr. Bleecker's pen were such as to make 
his friends regret that he did not elaborate a work 
on some weighty subject. He died a Christian 
death, in 1827, aged 57 years. His habits, his 
morals, his weight of character, may be inferred 
from the mention of his associates, Irving, Paul- 
ding, Verplanck, and Brevoort. The bar passed 
sympathizing resolutions on his demise, and John 
Pintard lost a wise counsellor. The portrait of 
Mr. Bleecker in the N. Y. Society Library, is a 
lifelike work of art. 

William Johnson is of too recent death not to 
be held in fresh remembrance by many now pres- 
ent. He was a native of Connecticut ; he settled 
early in New York, and entered upon the profes- 
sion of the law, and was engaged from 1806 to 
1823, as Kejoorter of the Supreme Court of New 
York, and from 1814 to 1823, of the Court of 
Chancery. He died in 1848, when he had passed 
his 80th year. He is recorded in the original act 
of your incorporation. He for many years had a 
watchful eye over the interests of the Society. 
It is beyond my province to speak of the value of 
his labors. He was of a calm and dignified bear- 
ing, and of the strictest integrity. As he was the 



PETER A. JAY. 71 

authorized reporter of the legal decisions of the 
State at a period when her juridical science was 
expounded by her greatest masters, Kent, Spen- 
cer, Van Ness, Thompson, &c., and was at its 
highest renown and of corresponding authority 
throughout the Union, his numerous volumes are 
pronounced the most valuable we possess in the 
department of law reports. He was liberal in his 
donations of that part of our library devoted to juris- 
prudence. His most interesting historical contri- 
butions to the library were those of the newspaper 
press : — the New York Daily Advertiser from its 
commencement, an uninterrupted series, until near 
its close, and the New York Evening Post from 
its beginning in 1801, and for many consecutive 
years, may be cited as proofs in point. 

With an earnestness surpassed by none of our 
earlier fraternity, the late Peter A. Jay espoused 
the cause of this institution, and contributed 
largely to its library. His benefactions embraced 
much of that curious and most valuable material 
you find classed with your rare list of newspapers, 
printed long before our Kevolutionary contest. I 
apprehend he must have been thus enabled through 
the liberality of his illustrious father. Governor 
Jay. Peter A. Jay was most solicitous in all his 
doings touching the Society, that the Association 
should restrict itself to its specified designation. 
Every thing relative to its historical transactions 



72 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

he would cherish, for he cleeraed New York the 
theatre on which the great events of the period of 
our colonization and of the war of independence 
transpired. It is nowise remarkahle that the 
library is so rich in newspaper and other periodi- 
cal journals. *^A file of. American newspapers/' 
said Mr. Jay, " is of far more value to our design, 
than all the Byzantine historians." You may 
well boast of the vast accumulation of that spe- 
cies of recorded knowledge within your walls. 

So far as I can recollect, our most efficient 
members, as Johnson, Jay, Pintard, McKesson, 
Clinton, Morris, and a host of others, have borne 
testimony to the high importance of preserving 
those too generally evanescent documents. They 
are the great source from which we are to derive 
our knowledge of the form and pressure of the 
times. No one was more emphatic in the declara- 
tion of this opinion than Gouverneur Morris. 

John McKesson, a nephew of the M'Kesson 
who was Secretary of the N. Y. Convention, an 
original member, was a large contributor to our 
Leo;islative documents ; not the least in value of 
which were the Journals of the Provincial Con- 
gress and Convention, together with the proceed- 
ings of the Committee of Safety from May, 1775, 
to the adoption of the State Constitution at the 
close of the Northern campaign in 1777. *^ They 
include," says our distinguished associate, Mr. Fol- 



SAMUEL BAYARD. 73 

som, " the period of tlie invasion of the territory 
of the State by the British army under General 
Burgoyne." 

The minutes of our first meeting notice the 
attendance of Samuel Bayard, jun. He was con- 
nected by marriage wdth the family of our found- 
er, Pintard, and they were most intimate friends. 
He was a gentleman of the old school, a scholar, a 
jurist, a trustee of Princeton College, a public- 
spirited man, and a hearty co-operator in estab- 
lishing this Association ; widely acquainted with 
historical occurrences, and, if I err not, on terms 
of personal communication with many of the ac- 
tive men of the Revolution, including Governor 
Livingston, of New Jersey. Through Mr. Bayard's 
agency and John Pintard, we obtained the Inde- 
pendent Reflector, the Watch Tower of 1754, the 
American Whig, &c., records indispensable to a 
right understanding of the controversy of the 
American Episcopate, and the contentions which 
sprung out of the charter of King's College. 
Livingston's life is full of occurrences : he was a 
voluminous writer on the side of liberty, when his 
country most needed such advocates : his patriot- 
ism was of the most intrejaid order, and he com- 
manded the approbation of Washington. Theo- 
dore Sedgwick, not long since, has given us his 
valuable biography, and the Duyckincks in the 
" Cyclopaedia of American Literature," a legacy 
4 



74 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

of precious value, for the consultation of writers 
on the progress of knowledge in the New World, 
have treated his character and his labors with 
ability and impartiality. Some forty years ago, I 
saw the prospectus for the publication of Gover- 
nor Livingston's works, in several volumes, at the 
office of the Messrs. Collins. Had the plan been 
executed, the arm of the patriot would have been 
nerved with increased strength in behalf of reli- 
gious toleration and the rights of man, by the no- 
ble defence of this bold explorer into the domain 
of popular freedom. But, alas ! the materials for 
the contemplated work, in print and in manu- 
script, were suffered to lie in neglect in a printing 
xoft, until time and the rats had destroyed them 
too far for typographical purposes. I was told 
that his son, Brockholst Livingston, the renowned 
United States judge, had the matter in charge, 
and I have presumed that the remembrance of his 
father's hterary labors was obliterated from his 
memory, through the weightier responsibilities of 
juridical business. I believe we are obligated to 
Samuel Bayard principally for that remarkable 
series of MSS., the Journals of the House of 
Commons during the Protectorate of Cromwell, 
which fill so conspicuous a niche in your library. 
Mr. Bayard, I apprehend, obtained them through 
Governor Livingston, or, perhaps, I would be more 
accurate, were I to say, that they were once in the 



GULIAN C. VERPLANCK. 75 

possession of tlie Governor. I remember bringing 
over from Paulus Hook, now Jersey City, some of 
tlie volumes. 

We possessed liberal benefactors in our earlier 
movements for a library, in Samuel M. Hopkins, 
Cadwallader D. Golden, and Gulian C. Yerplanck. 
This last-named gentleman, who is recorded as an 
early member, and whom, thanks to a beneficent 
Providence, we still hail among the living celebri- 
ties of the Eepublic, both in letters and in hu- 
manity, stored with varied knowledge, and actu- 
ated by true Knickerbocker feelings, deemed the 
library department of enduring importance, and 
with a comprehensive view affirmed, that it was 
the bounden duty of the Society to collect every 
book, pamphlet, chart, map, or newspaper that 
threw light on the progress of the State, its cities, 
towns, or on the history of its literature ; thus 
carrying out the plan unfolded in the Society's ad- 
dress to the public at their first organization. 
That we profit by more than his advice, may be 
seen in his historical discourse on the early Euro- 
pean friends of America, and the tribute he pays 
to the character of our forefathers, the Dutch and 
the Huguenots. 

There is probably little recorded on your min- 
utes of the services rendered the Historical Society 
by Kobert Fulton. Cut off too early in the midst 
of his great career very shortly after he had united 



76 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

in membership witli you, his opportunities of per- 
sonal attendance were limited ; and the mighty 
affairs which engrossed his time and weighed upon 
his intellect, yielded httle leisure from his engross- 
ing pursuits ; yet you had not one in your list 
who cherished a stronger zeal for the advancement 
of your important interests. His patriotic spirit 
was so eminently American ; his impulses so gen- 
erous, and the intimate relations which he held 
with the Livingstons, many of whom were most 
anxious to secure the perpetuity of your institu- 
tion, all served to rivet his affections to advance 
the great ends you had in view. On his agency in 
enabling you to secure the Gates' papers, I need 
not dwell ; he justly appreciated their value, and 
deemed it a duty that they should be preserved for 
the future historian. He comprehended the philo- 
sophy of history as well as the philosophy of steam 
navigation. 

Amid a thousand individuals you might 
readily point out Robert Fulton. He was conspic- 
uous for his gentlemanly bearing and freedom 
from embarrassment ; for his extreme activity, his 
height, somewhat over six feet, his slender yet en- 
ergetic form, and well-accommodated dress; for 
his full and curly dark brown hair, carelessly scat- 
tered over his forehead, and falling round about his 
neck. His complexion was fair ; his forehead 
high ; his eyes large, dark, and penetrating, and 



ROBERT FULTON. 77 

revolving in a capacious orbit of cavernous depth ; 
his brow was thick, and evinced strength and de- 
termination ; his nose was long and prominent ; 
his mouth and lips were beautifully proportioned, 
giving the impress of eloquent utterance, equally 
as his eyes displayed, according to phrenology, a 
pictorial talent and the benevolent affections. In 
his sequestered moments a ray of melancholy marked 
his demeanor ; in the stirring affairs of active 
business you might readily designate him, indiffer- 
ent to surrounding objects and persons, giving 
directions, and his own personal appliances, to 
whatever he might be engaged in. Thus have I 
often observed him on the docks, reckless of tem- 
perature and inclement weather, in our early 
steamboat days, anxious to secure practical issues 
from his midnight reflections, or to add new im- 
provements to works not yet completed. His 
floating dock cost him much personal labor of this 
sort. His hat might have fallen in the water, and 
his coat be lying on a pile of lumber, yet Fulton's 
devotion was not diverted. Trifles were not calcu- 
lated to impede him, or damp his perseverance. 

There are those who have judged the sym- 
pathies of our nature by the grasp of the hand : 
this rule, applied to Mr. Fulton's salutation, 
only strengthened your confidence in the de- 
clarations he uttered. He was social ; capti- 
vating to the young, instructive even to the 



78 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

wisest. He was linked in close association witli 
the leading characters of our city ; with. Emmet, 
Golden, Clinton, Mitchill, Hosack, Macneven, and 
Morris. A daughter of his first-named friend, 
with artistic talents has painted his interesting- 
features and his habitat. After all, few eminent 
men recorded on the rolls of fame encountered a 
life of severer trials and provoking annoyance. 
The incredulity which prevailed as to the success of 
his projects, as they were called, created doubts in 
the bosoms of some of his warmest friends, and 
the cry of " Crazy Fulton,'' issuing at times from 
the ignoble masses, I have heard reverberated from 
the lips of old heads, pretenders to science. Nor 
is this all. Even at the time when the auspicious 
moment had arrived, when his boat was now 
gliding on the waters, individuals were found still 
incredulous, who named his vast achievement the 
Marine Smoke Jack and Fulton's Folly. With 
philosophical composure he stood unruffled and 
endured all. He knew what Watt and every great 
inventor encounter. During his numerous years 
of unremitting toil, his genius had solved too many 
difficult problems not to have taught him the prin- 
ciples on which his success depended, and he was 
not to be dismayed by the yells of vulgar ignorance. 
Besides, he was working for a nation, not for liim- 
self, and the magnitude of the object absorbed all 
other thoughts. 



ROBERT FULTON. 79 

Mr. Fulton was empliatically a man of tlie 
people, ambitious indeed, but void of all sordid 
designs ; be pursued ideas more tlian money. 
Science was more captivating to bim tban pecu- 
niary gains, and tbe ]3romotion of tbe arts, useful 
and refined, more absorbing tban tbe accumiila- 
tion of tbe miser's treasures. 

I sball never forget tbat nigbt of February 
24tb, 1815, a frosty nigbt indeed, on wbicb be 
died. Dr. Hosack, with wbom I was associated 
in business, and wbo saw bim in consultation witb 
Dr. Bruce, in tbe last bours of bis illness, returning 
home at midnigbt from bis visit, remarked, 
^' Fulton is dying ; bis severe cold amidst tbe 
ice, in crossing tbe river, bas brought on an alarm- 
ing inflammation and glossitis. He extended to 
me," continued tbe Doctor, " bis generous band, 
grasping mine closely, but be could no longer 
speak." I bad been witb Mr. Fulton at bis residence 
but a short time before, to arrange some papers 
relative to Chancellor Livingston and the floating 
dock erected at Brooktyn. Business dispatched, 
he entered upon the character of West, the paint- 
er, the Columbiad of Barlow, and the great pic- 
tures of Lear and Ophelia, which he had deposited 
in the American Academy. This interview of an 
hour with the illustrious man has often furnished 
grateful reflections. 

I enter not into a consideration of the special 



80 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE, 

claims whicli Fulton possesses as the inventor of 
steam navigation ; it is sufficient for me on this 
occasion to know, that at the time when the Cler- 
mont steamed her way on the Hudson from New 
York for Albany on the 7th September, 1807, not 
another steamboat was in successful operation, save 
his own, throughout the globe. Well might the 
eloquent Grouverneur Morris exclaim, in his in- 
augural discourse before your Historical Society, 
" A bird hatched on the Hudson will soon people 
the floods of the Wolga ; and cygnets descended 
from an American swan, glide along the surface 
of the Caspian sea." ••' 

A word or two in relation to another worthy 
member of our fraternity, whose life and character 
were directed with successful results in behalf of 
New York, and who, amid numerous benevolent 
engagements, was never indifferent to your His- 
torical Association : I allude to the late Thomas 
Eddy, a philanthropist in the fullest acceptance of 
the term. He w^as of the Society of Friends, but 
free of all sectional bias ; he had laid the founda- 
tion of a solid elementary education, had embarked 
in mercantile transactions, viewed men and things 
with the wisdom of an inductive philosopher, read 
largely ethical compends and books of voyages and 

* See Colden's Life of Fulton ; Walsh's Appeal, &c., and the 
life-like delineation of Fulton, by Tuckerman, in his Biographical 

Essays. 



THOMAS EDDY. 81 

travels, and was versed in Quaker theology from 
Fox and Barclay down to Sarah Grubb, the re- 
nowned Elias Hicks, and the experience of the 
last field preacher. The greater part of his life 
was devoted to charitable and humane purposes. 
He was associated with the Manumission Society 
with Golden ; with the New York Hospital with 
Kobert Bowne ; with our Free School system with 
Isaac Collins and John Murray ; and his name is 
ever to hold a conspicuous place in the Society for 
the Keformation of Juvenile Delinquents, and the 
establishment of the House of Refuge with John 
Griscom, Isaac Collins, and James W. Gerard. 
With De Witt Clinton he was the most promi- 
nent individual to project and organize the Bloom- 
ingdale Asylum for the Insane. He corresponded 
largely with the philanthropists abroad as well as 
at home, on the critical and responsible subject of 
diseased manifestations of intellect ; and his pa- 
tient labors for a series of years, by letters with 
Tuke and Colquhoun, Roscoe and Lindley Murray 
in Europe, with Jefferson, Clinton, and Hosack, 
his American friends, rendered his opinions of cor- 
responding weight in the discussions which finally 
led to the adoption in this metropolis of the moral 
management of madness. His strong common 
sense often penetrated deeper than the judgment 
of some of his ablest associates. Chancellor Kent 
gives a striking instance of this truth in a sketch 
4* 



82 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

of his character addressed to Knapp, the biogra- 
pher of Eddy ; and his great tact in the cases of 
lunacy of the celebrated Count Regnaud de St. 
Jean D'Angely, proved that he might have en- 
countered with triumph the interrogatories of the 
stoutest committee on medical jurisprudence. His 
fiscal integrity afforded a captivating illustration of 
his Christian belief. His early career in merchan- 
dise proved disastrous, and embarrassments of 
himself and fiiends for years followed : by the 
simplicity of his habits and a rigid economy, he 
was again made whole, when he discharged with 
fidelity every obligation with interest. I always 
thought that by this one act he had mounted at 
least a rung or two up Jacob's ladder. — These few 
specifications must suffice for a touch of the qual- 
ity of the man. Eddy was a great utilitarian, 
and quoted Franklin as John Pintard did his mid- 
night companion, Samuel Johnson. He told most 
pleasant stories of his canal explorations with 
Clinton and Morris. He was a model of industry, 
and more economical of time than of health. No 
saint ever battled vdth. sin more earnestly than he 
did with procrastination and delay. His apho- 
risms were the fruits of practical humanity, and 
the whining cadences of the mere sentimentalist 
he shook off as if leprous. It must have been a 
trying sickness that arrested the march of his mul- 
tifarious business, and his occasional physical suf- 



THOMAS EDDY. 83 

ferings were rarely adverted to by him. The lines 
of Cowper would not apply to Eddy ; he was filled 
with other ideas. 

" Some people use their health (an ugly trick) 
In telhng you how oft they have been sick." 

Our public charities and the Historical Society 
encountered a loss by his death, which occurred 
in 1827, at the ripe age of l(f years. He left a 
name a synonym for benevolence. 

From the studies and accomphshments of the 
well-instructed physician, from the wide range of 
knowledge, physical and mental, that falls within 
his observation ; from the fact that every depart- 
ment of Nature must be explored, the better to 
discipHne him properly to exercise his art ; the in- 
ference may be readily drawn that the faculty of 
medicine would scarcely prove indifferent to the 
creation of an institution fraught with such incen- 
tives to intellectual culture, as are necessarily em- 
braced within the range and intentions of our 
Historical Society. Moreover, I incline to the 
belief, that veneration for our j^redecessors is some- 
what a characteristic of the cultivators of medi- 
cal philosophy : the past is not to be overlooked, 
and the means for its preservation is in itself an 
intellectual advancement. The concurrence of the 
leading medical men of that early day was proved 
by the fellowship of Hosack, Bruce, Mitchill, 



84 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Miller, Williamson, and, shortly after, by N. Ro- 
mayne, and others of renown. These distin- 
guished characters need no commendation of ours 
at this time. Your secretary has made records of 
their services, and it has so chanced, that, from 
personal intimacy, I have long ago been enabled 
to present humble memorials in different places, 
of their professional influence and deeds. They 
were men of expansive views, nor were the ele- 
ments of practical utility idle in their hands. Of 
my preceptor and friend, David Hosack, let it be 
sufficient to remark that, distinguished beyond all 
his competitors in the healing art, for a long series 
of years, he was acknowledged, by every hearer, 
to have been the most eloquent and impressive 
teacher of scientific medicine and clinical practice 
this country has produced. He was, indeed, a 
great instructor ; his descriptive powers and his 
diagnosis were the admiration of all ; his efficien- 
cy in rearing, to a state of high consideration, the 
College of Physicians and Surgeons, while he held 
the responsible office of professor, is known through- 
out the Republic ; his early movements to estab- 
Ksh a medical library in the New York Hospital ; 
his co-operation with the numerous charities which 
glorify the metropolis ; his adventurous outlay of 
the establishment of a State Botanical Garden ; 
his hygienic suggestions the better to improve the 
medical police of New York ; his primary forma- 



DAVID HOSACK. 85 

tion of a, mineralogical cabinet ; his copious writ- 
ings on fevers, quarantines, and foreign pestilence, 
in which he was the strenuous and almost the sole 
advocate for years, of doctrines now verified by 
popular demonstration ; these, and a thousand 
other circumstances, secured to him a weight of 
character that was almost universally felt through- 
out the metropolis. It was not unfrequently re- 
marked by our citizens, that CHnton, Hosack, and 
Hobart, were the tripod on which our city stood. 
The lofty aspirations of Hosack were further 
evinced by his whole career as a citizen. Sur- 
rounded by his large and costly hbrary, his house 
was the resort of the learned and enlightened from 
every part of the world. No traveller from abroad 
rested satisfied without a personal interview with 
him ; and, at his evening soirees, the literati, the 
philosopher, and the statesman, the skilful in nat- 
ural science, and the explorer of new regions, the 
archa3ologist and the theologue, met together, par- 
ticipators in the recreation of familiar intercourse. 
Your printed v.olumes contain all, I believe, he 
ever prepared for you as your President. His 
strictly medical writings are of some extent, and 
have excited a profitable emulation in the cause of 
science and humanity, and renewed inquiry into 
the causes of pestilence and the laws of contagion. 
His memoir of his friend De Witt Clinton, is a 
tribute to the talents and heroic virtues of that 



86 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

great statesman, and contains the most ample his- 
tory we possess of the origin, progress, and termi- 
nation of the Erie Canal. His life was a triumph 
in services rendered and in honors received ; his 
death was a loss to New York, the city of his 
hirth ; his remains were followed to the grave by 
the eminent of every profession, and by the hum- 
ble in hfe whom his art had relieved. Hosack was 
a man of profuse expenditure ; he regarded money 
only for what it might command. Had he pos- 
sessed the wealth of John Jacob Astor, he might 
have died poor. 

Early at the commencement of your patriotic 
undertaking, was recorded Archibald Bruce as a 
member. We had, at that time, more than one 
Bruce in the faculty among us. He of the His- 
torical Society was the physician and mineralogist. 
He was born in New York in 1771, was graduated 
at Columbia College, studied medicine with Ho- 
sack, and, in 1800, received the doctorate at the 
Edinburgh University. While in Scotland, he 
acquired a knowledge of the Wernerian theory 
under Jameson, and subsequently became a corre- 
spondent of the Abbe Haliy, the founder of Crys- 
tallography. He collected a large cabinet of min- 
erals while travelling about in Europe, projected 
the " American Journal of Mineralogy" in 1810, 
the first periodical of that science in the United 
States, and was created Mineralogical Professor by 



SAMUEL L. MITCHILL. 87 

the regents of the University, at the organization 
of the College of Physcians and Surgeons. He 
had a cultivated taste for the Fine Arts, and con- 
tributed to our Library. He died in 1818. His 
reputation rests with his discovery, at Hoboken, of 
the Hydrate of Magnesia. In " SilUman's Jour- 
nal " there is a biography of him. 

The universal praise which Dr. Mitchill en- 
joyed in almost every part of the globe Avhere sci- 
ence is cultivated, during a long life, is demon- 
strative that his merits were of a high order. A 
discourse might be delivered on the variety and 
extent of his services in the cause of learning and 
humanity ; and as his biography is already before 
the public, in the "National Portrait Gallery," 
and we are promised that by Dr. Akerly, I have 
little to say at this time but what may be strictly 
associated with our Institution. His character 
had many peculiarities : his knowledge was diver- 
sified and most extensive, if not always profound. 
Like most of our sex, he was married ; but, as 
Old Fuller would say, the only issues of his body 
were the products of his brain. He advanced the 
scientific reputation of New York by his early 
promulgation of the Lavoisierian system of chem- 
istry, when first appointed professor in Columbia 
College : his first scientific paper was an essay on 
Evaporation : his mineralogical survey of New 
York, in 1797, gave Volney many hints : Ms 



88 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

analysis of tlie Saratoga waters enhanced tlie im- 
portance of those mineral springs. His ingenious 
theory of septic acid gave impulse to Sir Hum- 
phrey Davy's vast discoveries ; his doctrines on 
pestilence awakened inquiry from every class of 
observers throughout the Union : his expositions 
of a theory of the earth and solar systems, capti- 
vated minds of the highest qualities. His corre- 
spondence with Priestley is an example of the de- 
licious manner in which argument can be con- 
ducted in philosophical discussion ; his elaborate 
account of the fishes of our waters invoked the 
plaudits of Cuvier. His reflections on Somnium 
evince psychological views of original combination. 
His numerous papers on natural history enriched 
the annals of the Lyceum, of which he was long 
president. His researches on the ethnological 
characteristics of the red man of America, be- 
trayed the benevolence of his nature and his gen- 
erous spirit : his fanciful article for a new and 
more appropriate geographical designation for the 
United States, was at one period a topic which 
enlisted a voluminous correspondence, now printed 
in your Proceedings. He increased our knowledge 
of the vegetable materia medica of the United 
States. He wrote largely to Percival on noxious 
agents. He cheered Fulton when dejected ; en- 
couraged Livingston in appropriation ; awakened 
new zeal in Wilson the ornithologist, when the 



SAMUEL L. MITCHILL. 89 

Governor, Tompkins, had. nigh paralyzed him by 
his frigid and unfeeling reception ; and, with Pin- 
tard and Golden, was a zealous promoter of that 
system of internal improvement which has stamped 
immortality on the name of Clinton. He co- 
operated with Jonathan Williams in furtherance 
of the Military Academy at West Point, and for 
a long series of years was an important professor 
of useful knowledge in Columbia College and in 
the College of Physicians and Surgeons. His let- 
ter to Tilloch, of London, on the progress of his 
mind in the investigation of septic acid, is curious 
as a physiological document. The leading papers 
from his pen are to be found in the New York 
Medical Repository ; yet he wrote in the Ameri- 
can Medical and Philosophical Register, the New 
York Medical and Physical Journal, the Ameri- 
can Mineralogical Journal, and supphed several 
other periodicals, both abroad and at home, with 
the results of his cogitations. He was one of the 
commissioners appointed by the general govern- 
ment for the construction of a new naval force to 
be propelled by steam, the steamer Fulton the 
First. While he was a member of the United 
States Senate, he was unwearied in effecting the 
adoption of improved quarantine laws ; and, among 
his other acts important to the public weal, 
strenuous to lessen the duties on the importa- 
tion of rags, in order to render the manufac- 



90 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

tiire of paper cheaper, to aid the diffusion of 
knowledge by printing. 

There was a rare union in Dr. Mitchill of a 
mind of vast and multifarious knowledge and of 
poetic imagery. Even in his " Epistles to his 
Lady Love/' the excellent lady who became his 
endeared wife, he gave utterance of his emotions 
in tuneful numbers, and likened his condition unto 
that of the dove, with trepidation seeking safety 
in the ark. Ancient and modern languages were 
unlocked to him, and a wide range in physical sci- 
ence, the pabulum of his intellectual rej)ast. An 
essay on composts, a tractate on the deaf and 
dumb, verses to Septon or to the Indian tribes, 
might be eliminated from his mental alembic 
within the compass of a few hours. He was now 
engaged with the anatomy of the egg, and now 
deciphering a Babylonian brick ; now involved in 
the nature of meteoric stones, now on the different 
species of brassica ; now on the evaporization of 
fresh water, now on that of salt ; now offering 
suggestions to Garnet, of New Jersey, the corre- 
spondent of Mark Akenside, on the angle of the 
windmill, and now concurring with Michaux on 
the beauty of the black walnut as ornamental for 
parlor furniture. In the morning he might be 
found composing songs for the nursery, at noon 
dietetically experimenting and writing on fishes, 
or unfolding a new theory on terrene formations, 



SAMUEL L. MITCHILL. 91 

and at evening addressing his fair readers on the 
healthy influences of the alkalis, and the depura- 
tive virtues of whitewashing. At his country re- 
treat at Plandome he might find full employment 
in translating, for his mental diversion, Lancisi on 
the fens and marshes of Rome, or in rendering into 
English poetry the piscatory eclogues of Sannaza- 
rius. Yesterday, in workmanhke dress, he might 
have been engaged, with his friend Elihu H. 
Smith, on the natural history of the American elk, 
or perplexed as to the alimentary nature of tad- 
poles, on which, according to Noah Webster, the 
people of Vermont almost fattened during a sea- 
son of scarcity ; to-day, attired in the costume of 
a native of the Feejee Islands, (for presents were 
sent him from all quarters of the globe,) he was 
better accoutred for illustration, and for the recep- 
tion, at his house, of a meeting of his philosophi- 
cal acquaintance ; while to-morrow, in the scho- 
lastic robes of an LL.D., he would grace the exer- 
cises of a college commencement. 

I have but very imj^erfectly glanced at the lit- 
erary and scientific writings of Dr. Mitchill : they 
are too numerous to notice at length on this occa- 
sion. To his biographer must be assigned that 
duty. His detailed narrative of the earthquakes 
which occurred on the 16th day of December, 1811, 
and which agitated the parts of North America 
that lie between the Atlantic Ocean and Louisi- 



92 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

ana, and of. subsequent occurrences of a like na- 
ture, is a record of physical phenomena well wor- 
thy the notice of our Storm Kings, but which 
seems to have escaped the attention even of our 
distinguished philosopher, Dr. Maury, the famed 
author of the Physical Geography of the Sea/* 
Of his collegiate labors in the several branches of 
knowledge, which he taught for almost fortj^ years, 
I shall assume the privilege of saying a few words. 
His appearance before his class was that of an 
earnest instructor, ready to impart the stores of 
his accumulated wisdom for the benefit of his 
pupils, while his oral disquisitions were perpetually 
enlivened with novel and ingenious observations. 
Chemistry, which first engaged his capacious 
mind, was rendered the more captivating by his 
endeavors to imjprove the nomenclature of the 
French savans, and to render the science subservi- 
ent to the useful purposes of art and hygiene. In 
treating of the materia medica, he delighted to 
dwell on the riches of our native products for the 
art of healing, and he sustained an enormous cor- 
respondence throughout the land, in order to ^dd 
to his own practical observations the experience of 
the competent, the better to prefer the claims of 
our indigenous products. As a physician of the 



* Transactions of the New York Literary and Philosophical 
Society, 410., vol. i. pp. 281-310. 



SAMUEL L. MITCHILL. 93 

New York Hospital, he never omitted, when the 
opportunity presented, to employ the results of 
his investigations for clinical appliances. The 
simplicity of his prescriptions often provoked a 
smile on the part of his students ; while he was 
acknowledged a sound prescriber at the bedside. 
His anecdotical remarks on theories and systems 
at once declared that he was fully apprised of pre- 
vious therapeutical means, from the deductions of 
Hippocrates and Pliny, to the fanciful speculations 
of Darwin. But his great forte was natural his- 
tory. Here his expositions of that vast science, in 
its several ramifications, gave the best proofs of 
his capacious stores of bookish and personal knowl- 
edge. He may fairly be pronounced the pioneer 
investigator of geological science among us, pre- 
ceding McClure by several years. He was early 
led to give his countenance to the solidity of the 
Wernerian theory, but had occasion to announce 
his belief, from subsequent investigation in after 
life, that the Huttonian system was not wholly 
without facts deduced from certain phenomena in 
this country. His first course of lectures on Nat- 
ural History, including geology, mineralogy, zoolo- 
gy, ichthyology, and botany, was delivered, in ex- 
ienso, in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, 
in 1811, before a gratified audience, who recog- 
nized in the professor a teacher of rare attain- 
ments and of singular tact in unfolding complex 



94 ■ HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

knowledge with analytic power. Few left tlie lec- 
tures without the conviction that an able expositor 
had enlisted their attention. There was a whole- 
some natural theology blended with his prelec- 
tions, and an abundance of patriotism associated 
with every rich specimen of native mineral wealth. 
It would have proved difficult for him to have 
found adequate language to express his gratifica- 
tion at the present day of our Cahfornian treas- 
ures. His manner throughout as an instructor 
was calculated to attract the attention of the stu- 
dents by his intelligible language and his pleasing 
elucidations. His confidence in his expositions 
was not always permanent ; new facts often led to 
new opinions ; but the uncertainties of geological 
doctrines, not yet removed, gave him sometimes 
more freedom of expression than rigid induction 
might justify ; and when he affirmed as his belief 
that the American continent was the Old World, 
and that the Garden of Eden might have origi- 
nally been located in Onondaga Hollow, he im- 
posed a tax on credulity too onerous to bear. He 
felt, in contemplating his investigations on fishes, 
as though he had enlarged the boundaries of sci- 
ence, and his exclamation, " Show me a fin, and I 
will point out the fish,'' was not thought too 
hyperbolical by his scholars. For nearly a score of 
years it was my lot to be associated in collegiate 
labors with this renowned man ; and I may be 



SAMUEL L. MITCHILL. 95 

pardoned if my remarks are of some lengtli on his 
professorial career. 

I never encountered one of more wonderful 
memory : when quite a young man, he would re- 
turn from church service, and write out the ser- 
mon nearly verbatim. There was little display 
in his habits or manners. His means of enjoy- 
ment corresponded with his desires, and his Frank- 
linean principles enabled him to rise suj^erior to 
want. With aU his official honors and scientific 
testimonials, foreign or native, he was ever acces- 
sible to everybody ; the counsellor of the young, 
the dictionary of the learned. To the interroga- 
tory, why he did not, after so many years of labor, 
revisit abroad the scenes of his earher days for 
recreation, his reply was brief : — " I know Great 
Britain from the Grampian Hills to the chalky 
cliffs of Dover : there is no need of my going to 
Europe, Europe now comes to me." But I must 
desist. The Historical Society of New York will 
long cherish his memory for the distinction he shed 
over our institution, his unassuming manners, his 
kind nature, and the aid he was ever ready to give 
to all who needed his counsel. He furnished an 
eulogium on our deceased member, the great jurist, 
Thomas Addis Emmet, also on Samuel Bard ; his 
discourse on the Botany of North and South 
America, is printed by the Society in their Collec- 
tions. Mitchill has not unjustly been pronounced 



96 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

the Nestor of American science. He died in New- 
York in 1831 : his remains now He in the Green- 
wood Cemetery. 

The claims of Edward Miller to your remem- 
brance are associated with those of his brother 
Samuel. Edward Miller, learned and accom- 
plished as a scholar, generous and humane as a 
physician, urbane and refined as a gentleman, was 
of that order of intellect that could at once see 
the relationship which such a society as this holds 
with philosophy, and the record of those occur- 
rences on which pliilosophy is founded. That he 
aided his reverend brother in that portion of the 
" Brief Retrospect '* which treats of science in 
general, and of medicine in particular, was often 
admitted by the gifted divine. I have in strong 
recollection the enthusiastic terms in which Dr. 
Edward Miller spoke of our organization at the 
memorable anniversary in 1809 ; and all versed in 
our medical annals can give none other than ap- 
probation of his professional writings, though they 
may maintain widely different opinions from some 
inculcated by other practical observers, and have 
received a counterblast in the occurrences which 
marked the introduction of pestilential yellow 
fever in several sections of the Union in the year 
1856. He survived the commencement of the So- 
ciety but a few years, djdng in March, 1812. I 
accompanied him, in consultation, in the last pro- 



HUGH WILLIAMSON. 9*7 

fessional visit lie made, in a case of pneumonia, a 
few weeks before his death. In the sick room he 
was a cordial for affliction. His biography was 
written by his brother, and I have given a memoir 
of his life which may be found in the American 
Medical and Philosophical Kegister. 

I will close the record of our friends belonging 
to the medical faculty, with a brief notice of two 
other members, Hugh Williamson and Nicholas 
Romayne ; the former by birth a Pennsylvanian, 
born in 1735, the latter a native, born in the city 
of New York, 1756. After the acquisition of 
sound preliminary knowledge, Williamson was 
graduated M. D. at the University of Utrecht, 
Holland. He practised physic but a short time in 
Philadelphia, on account of dehcate health. In 
1769 he was appointed chairman of a committee 
consisting of Rittenhouse, Ewing, Smith, the pro- 
vost, and Charles Thompson, afterwards secretary 
to Congress, all mathematicians and astronomers, 
to observe the transit of Yenus in 1769. He pub- 
lished an Essa,y on Comets, afterwards enlarged, 
and printed in the Transactions of the Literary 
and Philosophical Society of New York. In this 
communication he adheres to his original opinion, 
that every planet and every comet in our system is 
inhabited. By appointment w^ith Dr. Ewing, he 
made a tour in Great Britain in 1773, for the 
benefit of a literary institution. He wrote on the 
5 



98 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Gymnotius electricus, and upon Lis return to 
North Carolina was an active agent in the promo- 
tion of inoculation, and finally received a commis- 
sion as head of the medical staff of the American 
army of that State. In 1782 he took his seat as 
a rej)resentative of Edenton in the House of Com- 
mons of North Carolina. In 1786 he was one oi 
the few members who were sent to Annapolis on 
the amendment of the constitution, and in 1789 
we find him in Nev/ York, and in the first Con- 
gress, when the constitution was carried into 
effect. He wrote an octavo volume on the climate 
of America. He contends, from numerous facts, 
that the climate is ameliorated, and Jefferson ad- 
mitted that his memoir was an ingenious, sound, 
and satisfactory piece of philosophy. In the Med- 
ical-Repository he offered some new and ingenious 
speculations on the fascinating powers of serpents. 
In 1812 appeared his History of North Carolina. 
He was the author of several papers on medical and 
philosophical subjects, and on the canal policy of the 
State, printed in the American Medical and Philo- 
sophical Register. He was among the first of our 
citizens who entertained correct vievv^s on the practi- 
cability of the union of the waters of the Hudson 
and Lake Erie. He penned the first summons for 
the formation of the Literary and Philosophical 
Society of New York. He died in 1819, at the 
advanced age of 83 years. 



HUGH WILLIAMSON. 99 

The career of Williamson is well known from 
the ample Biography of his friend and physician, 
Dr. Hosack. He was justly esteemed for his tal- 
ents, his virtues, and his public services. Hosack 
affirmed on the testimony of Bishop White, John 
Adams, President of the United States, Gen. 
Keed, and John Williamson, that Hugh William- 
son was the individual who, by an ingenious de- 
vice, obtained the famous Hutchinson and Oliver 
letters from the British foreign office for Franklin, 
and I can add that John Williamson, the brother 
of the doctor, communicated to me his concur- 
rence in the same testimony. This curious rela- 
tion is however rejected as not well founded, by 
our eminent historians. Sparks and Bancroft. 

Williamson was a peculiarity in appearance, in 
manners, and in address. Tall and slender in per- 
son, with an erect gait, he perambulated the 
streets with the air of a man of consideration ; 
his long arms and his longer cane preceding him 
at a commanding distance, and seemingly guided 
by his conspicuous nose, while his ample white 
locks gave tokens of years and wisdom. Activity 
of mind and body blessed him to the last of his 
long life. His speech was brief, sententious, and 
emphatic. He was often aphoristic, always perti- 
nacious in opinion. There was rarely an aj)peal 
from his decision — ^lie was generally so well forti- 
fied. He had great reverence for the past, was 



100 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

anecdotical in our revolutionary matters, and cher- 
ished with almost reverential regard the series of 
cocked hats which he had worn at different times, 
during the eight years' crisis of his country. His 
History of North Carolina has encountered the 
disapprobation of many, and is deemed defective 
and erroneous, yet he was a devoted disciple of 
truth. No flattery, no compliment could ever 
reach his ear. Witness his curt correspondence 
with the Itahan artist, Caracchi : look at his tes- 
timony in the case of Alexander Whisteloe. To a 
solicitation for pecuniary aid in behalf of an indi- 
vidual whose moral character he somewhat doubt- 
ed, when told that a reform had taken place : 
" Not so," replied the doctor, " he has not left 
the stage, — the stage has left him." His punctu- 
ality in engagements was marvellous ; no hour, no 
wind or weather, ever occasioned a disappointment 
on the part of the old man, now over eighty years 
of age ; and, though in his own business transac- 
tions, from which mainly he derived his ample 
support, one might apprehend the requirement of 
much time, he let not the setting sun close upon 
him without their entire adjustment. He died, if 
I remember rightly, about the hour of 4 o'clock in 
the afternoon, while in a carriage excursion to the 
country, from excessive solar heat, in June ; yet 
it was found that his multifarious accounts and 



HUGH WILLIAMSON. 101 

correspondence had all been adjusted, up to the 
hour of two on that same day. 

Some of my most gratifying hours in early life 
were passed with this venerable man : it was in- 
structive to enjoy the conversation of one who had 
enriched the pages of the Royal Society ; who had 
experimented with John Hunter, and Franklin, 
and Ingenhouze in London, and had enjoyed the 
soirees of Sir John Pringle ; who narrated occur- 
rences in which he bore a part when Franklin was 
Postmaster, and in those of subsequent critical 
times ; one who, if you asked him the size of the 
button on Washington's coat, might tell you who 
had been his tailor. A more strictly correct man 
in all fiscal matters could not be pointed out, 
whether in bonds and mortgages, or in the pay- 
ment of the postage of a letter. I will give an 
illustration. He had been appointed in Colonial 
times to obtain funds for the Seminary at Basken- 
ridge, N. J. : he set out on his eastern tour, pro- 
vided with an extra pair of gloves, for which he 
paid 7s. and 6d. ; on his return he revisited the 
store in Newark, where he had made the purchase, 
had the soiled gloves vamped anew, and parted 
with them for 6s. In his items of expenditure, 
he reports Is. and 6d. for the use of gloves, invest- 
ing the 6s. with the collection fund. Such was 
Hugh Williamson, whose breastplate was honesty, 
the brightest in the Christian armory. If I mis- 



102 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

take not, I think I once saw him smile at the trick 
of a jockey. Dr. Thacher, the author of the 
" Military Journal/' told me he had listened to 
him when he was in the ministry, in a sermon 
preached at Plymouth ; but his oratory was gro- 
tesque, and Kufus King the Senator, who noticed 
him in our first Congress, said his elocution pro- 
voked laughter. Yet he spoke to the point. 
Take him altogether, he was admirably fitted for 
the times, and conscientiously j)erformed many 
deeds of excellence for the period in which he 
lived. Deference was paid to him by every class 
of citizens. He holds a higher regard in my esti- 
mation, than a score of dukes and duchesses, for 
he signed the Constitution of the United States. 
His Anniversary Discourse for 1810 you have se- 
cured in your publications. The portrait of Dr. 
Williamson by Col. Ti-umbull, is true to the life, 
and eminently suggestive. 

A monograph on Romayne would not be too 
much. He entered the Historical Society some 
years after its formation. He is associated with 
innumerable occurrences in New York, his native 
city, and was born in 1756. Of his antecedents 
little is satisfactorily known. His early instruc- 
tion was received from Peter Wilson, the linguist, 
at his school at Hackensack. At the commence- 
ment of the war of the Revolution, he repaired to 
Edinburgh, where he pre-eminently distinguished 



NICHOLAS ROMAYNE. 103 

himself by his wide range of studies, his latinity, 
and his medical knowledge. His inaugural for the 
doctorate, j^repared unassisted, was a dissertation 
De Generatione Puris, in which he seems to have 
first promulgated the leading doctrines received on 
that vexed subject. He now visited London, 
Paris, and Leyden, for further knowledge, and re- 
turning to his native land, settled first in Phila- 
delphia, and shortly after in New York. He had 
a fair chance of becomino; a nractitioner of exten- 
sive employment. His erudition justified him in 
assuming the office of teacher, and he lectured 
with success on several branches of physic. He 
was pronounced an extraordinary man. Anatomy, 
chemistry, botany, and the practice of medicine, 
were assumed by him. His most eminent associ- 
ates, Bayley, Kissam, Moore, Treat, and Tillary, 
echoed his praises. He spoke with fluency the 
French and Latin tongues, and the Low Dutch. 

When the provincial government of King's 
College was changed after 1783, he was nominated 
one of the Trustees. The Board of the College, 
now Columbia, determined upon reviving a new 
faculty of medicine, but from causes too numerous 
to relate, Dr. Romayne was not chosen to an ap- 
pointment. In 1791, an act was passed, author- 
izing the Eegents of the University to organize a 
medical faculty, which, however, did not go into 
operation until January, 1807, when Dr. Romayne 



104 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

was appointed President of the College of Physi- 
cians and Surgeons under their authority. He 
gave lectures on Anatomy and on the Institutes. 
I was present at his opening address to the stu- 
dents on the ensuing November. It was an ele- 
gant and elaborate performance in science, and on 
the ethnology of the red man of America. He 
was a pleasing speaker ; his discourse justified all 
that had been previously expressed concerning his 
varied knowledge and his classical taste. He 
would rise in his place and dehver a lecture on the 
aphorisms of Hippocrates, unfold the structure of 
the brain, expound the philosophy of paludal dis- 
eases, or discourse on the plant which Clusius 
cherished. He was indeed clever in every accep- 
tation of the word. I find since that period, by 
an examination of his copy of the Conspectus 
M^dicinse of Gregory, and his MS. notes, that his 
Lectures on the Institutions were drawn chiefly 
from Gregory's work. Yet was he an original ob- 
server and an intrepid thinker. He died sudden- 
ly, after great exposure to heat, in June, 1817. 

It rarely occurs to any individual to enjoy a 
larger renown among his fellows, than did Dr. 
Komayne, during the time he filled the station of 
President of the College. Yet he was not con- 
tent with this condition of affairs, and was con- 
stantly studying new things, until ejected from his 
high office by the Kegents of the University, when 



NICHOLAS ROMAYNE. 105 

the venerable Samuel Bard was chosen as his 
successor. 

His penury in early life had taught Komayne 
the strictest economy. At Edinburgh his ward- 
robe was so slender, that it often reminded me of 
the verses of an old ballad : — 

" The man who has only one shirt, 
Whenever it's washed for his side, 
The offence is surely not his 

If he lies in his bed till it's dried." 

Such, hte rally, was the case with the student Ko- 
mayne, and still he bore himself with becoming 
respectabihty, and left the University one of the 
most accomplished of her sons in general knowl- 
edge and professional science. He did well enough 
during his two years in Philadelphia as a practi- 
tioner ; an equally favorable turn in business fol- 
lowed him in New York, in which place he settled 
as the British troops left the city. The spirit of 
adventure, however, seized him : he embarked in 
the scheme of Blount's conspiracy, was seized by 
the constituted authorities, and Pintard saw him 
conveyed to prison. In what manner his troubles 
were removed I am unable to state. I have heard 
of no special disclosures that he made. He was 
too long-headed for self-accusation, and however 
bellicose by nature, preferred his customary cau- 
tious habit. Romayne had learned the proverb of 



106 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

the old Hebrews : — " One word is worth a shekel 
— silence is wo¥th two/' But awhile after he re- 
visited Europe, became a licentiate of the Koyal 
College of Edinburgh, returned to his native city, 
and was chosen President of the College, an insti- 
tution of only two years later date than your own, 
and which, amidst great vicissitudes and an anom- 
alous government, has enriched with meritorious 
disciples the noble art of healing, and diffused un- 
told blessings throughout the land. 

Romayne was of huge bulk, of regular propor- 
tion, and of an agreeable and intelligent expres- 
sion of countenance, with a gray eye of deep pen- 
etration. It was almost a phenomenon to witness 
the light, gracious, and facile step of a man sur- 
passing some three hundred pounds in weight, and 
at all times assiduous in civic pursuits and closet 
studies. He was unwearied in toil, and of mighty 
energy. He was goaded by a strong ambition to 
excel in whatever he undertook, and he generally 
secured the object of his desire, at least profes- 
sionally. He was temj^erate in all his drinks, but 
his gastric powers were of inordinate capabilities. 
I should incur your displeasure were I to record 
the material of a single meal : he sat down with 
right good earnest and exclusive devotion at his 
repast. His auricular power seemed now sus- 
pended. Dr. Mitchill long ago had said that the 
stomach had no ears. In charity I have conjee- 



NICHOLAS EOMAYNE. ' 107 

tured that lie must have labored under a species 
of bulimia, which pathologists affirm will often 
pervert the moral faculties. His kind friend, the 
late Kev. Dr. M'Leod, tells us, that though many 
of his acts were crooked, yet that Romayne died 
in the consolations of the Christian religion. He 
was generous to the young, and ready with many 
resources to advance the student. He made a 
great study of man ; he was dexterous with legis- 
lative bodies, and at one period of his career was 
vested with almost all the honors the medical pro- 
fession among us can bestow. Some of the older 
medical waiters, whose works were found in the 
residue of the library of the late Dr. Peter Mid- 
dleton, as well as others of the late Dr. Romayne, 
were deposited in your library ; but of late years, 
I am sorry to say, I have not recognized them. 

I shall now take leave of the departed doctors, 
while memory cannot forget their living excellence, 
and cast a glance at some few circumstances, which, 
more or less immediate and remote, had an influ- 
ence in fostering those associations which finally 
accelerated public opinion, and led to the estab- 
lishment of the Historical Society at the fortunate 
epoch in which it was organized. 

The extraordinary occurrences of the American 
Revolution, which had left their impress on the 
minds of most of the patriots who had survived 
that mighty event, the peace of 1783, which 



108 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

closed the great drama, and now presented the 
country impoverished and in debt, its resources 
exhausted, its people rich in a knowledge of their 
rights, yet poor indeed in fiscal power, were cir- 
cumstances calculated to awaken a personal inter- 
est, more or less deep, in every bosom, and to 
excite inquiry, with a curious scrutiny, what his- 
tory would unfold of the marvellous trials through 
which the people had passed, and what historian 
would write the faithful record of their sufferings 
and their deeds. 

This city, which had been the occupancy of 
their enemies during that long struggle, though 
now freed from the British army, still retained a 
vast number of the Tory party, who, while they were 
ready to be the participators of the benefits of that 
freedom which sprung out of the Kevolution, were 
known to be dissatisfied by the mortifications of 
defeat, under which they still writhed, and whose 
principal relief was found in yielding the listening 
ear to any narrative that might asperse the purity 
of American devotion in the patriotic cause of 
liberty. Thus surrounded, the natives, the true 
Whigs, the rebel phalanx, so to speak, were often 
circumscribed in thought and in utterance. To 
recount the specifications of the wrongs which 
they had endured, as cited in the immortal Decla- 
ration of Independence, was deemed, by the de- 
feated and disaffected, cruel and unwise, so hard 



POLITICAL DIFFICULTIES. 109 

was it to root out the doctrines of colonial devo- 
tion. Here and there measures were in agitation, 
and suggestions hinted, the object of which was to 
prevent the pubUc reading of the Declaration on 
the 4th of July ; and even so late as July, 1804, 
I witnessed a turmoil which arose, upon the occa- 
sion of the expressed sentiments of the orator of 
the day, John W. Mulligan, Esq., now, I be- 
lieve, the oldest living graduate of Columbia 
College. 

It was in vain that appeals were made to the 
instructive facts of the issues of usurpation and 
oppression, that millions of property had been 
wantonly destroyed by British hirelings and mer- 
cenary troops, that individual rights and posses- 
sions had been disregarded, that the records of 
churches, of- institutions of learning, and the libra- 
ries of schools and colleges, had been consumed. 
A further glance at affairs presented the fact, that 
conflictitig and erroneous statements of the war 
itself, and the primary motives of action of its 
American leaders, were also perverted and taunt- 
ingly promulgated as true history by foreign 
writers. The champions of freedom were daily 
harassed. To be subjected to such a state of 
things, was no more nor less than to yield to re- 
newed degradation, and to leave the contest an 
imperfect work. In fine, the tares which had been 
rooted out were, it was apprehended, again to 



110 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

infest the soil, and liberty itself again to be endan- 
gered. 

Topics involving matters of this nature were 
not unfrequently the subjects of warm controversy. 
The people were cognizant of the ordeal through 
which they had passed. They knew there were 
still among us men of the same calibre for the 
hour of peril, as those who had proved themselves 
valiant indeed. They also recognized among us 
men who saw how difficult in the future would be 
the procurement of authentic documents for that 
volume, which, in after times, was destined to 
prove a second Kevelation to man, unless a proper 
and timely spirit were awakened by co-operation 
with living witnesses, with those who best knew the 
price of freedom by the cost of purchase, and who 
were duly apprised of the value of correct knowl- 
edge diffused among a new-born nation. The blood 
that had been spilt, the lives that had been lost, 
the treasures that had been expended, were fa- 
miliar truths of impressive force. But the memo- 
rials of a tyrannic government were still more 
palpable, in the destruction which laid waste so 
many places, and which encompassed the city 
round about. And what spectator, however in- 
different, could fail to learn by such demonstra- 
tions, and cherish in his bosom profitable medita- 
tions. I am speaking now, more especially, of the 
scenes presented in this city. But more than this. 



REVOLUTIONARY WORTHIES. Ill 

New York, which throughout her whole progress 
has been faithful to constitutional law, and may 
examine with a bold front her conduct both in 
peace and in war, had furnished noble intellect 
and strong muscle in the vast work of colonial dis- 
franchisement. She could boast of patriots who 
now found their homes as citizens among us, in 
the residence of their choice. The Clintons, the 
Livingstons, the Morrises, Jays — Hamilton, Fish, 
Gates, Steuben, M'Dougal, Kufus King, Duer, 
Ward, Williamson, Clarkson, Yarick, Pendleton, 
and hundreds of others, who had done service in 
the times that tried men's souls, were now domi- 
ciliated here. How often have I cast a lingering 
look at many of these worthies in their movements 
through the public ways, during the earlier period 
of this city, with here and there a Continental tri- 
cornered hat over their venerable fronts, a sight no 
less gratifying to the beholder than the fragrant 
wild rose scattered through the American forest. 
I am not now to tell you what species of knowl- 
edge these men diffused among the people, and 
what doctrines on liberty they espoused ; versed as 
they were in the school of experience, they could 
utter nothing but wisdom. Suffice it to remark, 
that they led to that accumulation of manuscripts 
of revolutionary documents, with which your libra- 
ry is especially enriched. 

Other circumstances urged the propriety of or- 



112 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

ganizing some institution which might enhance 
the patriotic object of a broad foundation, avail- 
able for the promotion of historical knowledge. It 
has been demonstrated in numerous instances, as I 
have in part intimated, that the stoiy of our Ke vo- 
lution, if ever honestly related, must be derived 
from domestic sources, and from the informed 
mind of the country. The prejudice abroad which 
had nullified facts, as in the proceedings instituted 
to suppress the work of Dr. Eamsey, and cut off 
its circulation in Europe ; the war of crimination 
which originated from General Burgoyne's publi- 
cations ; the difiiculties which arose from Sir Hen- 
ry Clinton's statements ; the Gallaway letters and 
documents, all could be cited in proof of the ex- 
pediency of a native historian assuming the re- 
sponsible trust. And when still further it was 
ascertained that Gordon's work, on which such 
strong hopes were fixed, arising not only from the 
general reputation of the writer, but strengthened 
by a knowledge of the opportunities he enjoyed 
for information, and the labor and devotion he had 
paid to his subject : when, I remark, it was ascer- 
tained that that work was subjected to purification 
by British authority, because it contained asper- 
sions (so called) on the British character, that it 
recorded too many atrocious truths to assimilate 
well with the digestive functions of John Bull ; 
further, that audacious threats were held out that, 



BRITISH DISCIPLINE. 113 

if pubHshed as written by tbe honest author, from 
its faithful representations of the acts of many of 
the renowned characters of the British army and 
navy, it would lead to libel upon Hbel, damages 
upon damages, and thus impoverish the writer, as 
truth ever so well grounded, even if permitted to 
be adduced, could not, according to statute, plead 
in mitigation, thus defeating that integrity at 
which Gordon had arrived ; facts of this notorious 
nature, comprehended even by the masses, could 
be productive of no other result than to strengthen 
the general opinion that the American mind must 
be up and doing, if ever the seal of truth was to 
stamp her imprimatur on the history of the Ameri- 
can Kevolution.* 



* Dr. Waterhouse, in his work on Junius and his Letters, has 
very explicitly given us a brief statement of these nefarious trans- 
actions. I quote from his preliminary view the following extract : 
" A very valuable and impartial history of the American Revolution 
was written by the Rev. William Gordon, D. i>., an Englishman ; 
who resided about twelve years in Massachusetts, and had access 
to the best authorities, including that of Washington, Greene, 
Knox, and Gates, and the journals of Congress and of the Legisla- 
tures of the several States. He injudiciously returned to England, 
there to print his interesting history. He deemed it prudent to 
submit his manuscript to a gentleman learned in the law, to mark 
such chapters and passages as might endanger prosecution, when 
the lawyer returned it with such a large portion expurgated as to 
reduce about four volumes to three. The author being too aged 
and too infirm to venture upon a voyage back to America, and too 
poor withal, he submitted to its publication in a mutilated state ; 
and thus the most just and impartial history of the American war, 



114 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Our friend Pintard repeatedly gave wings to 
these abuses of foreign writers, as preparatory to 
his movements for an liistorical society. He was 
too full of knowledge, both by observation and by 
reading, not to feel himself doubly armed on the 
subject ; and your intelligent Librarian, Mr. Moore, 
can point out to you how ample is your collection 
of volumes on the Indian, the French, and the 
Revolutionary wars, chiefly brought together by 
the zeal and research of your enlightened founder. 

Will you allow me now to come more closely at 
home, and offer a few remarks on the occurrences 
in our midst, which in the end swelled the tide 
of popular feeling in behalf of your institution. 
" No people in the world," says a late lamented 
citizen, Herman E. Ludwig, " can have so great an 
interest in the history of their country, as those 
of the United States of North America ; " " for 
there are none," adds this learned German, " who 
enjoy an equally great share in their country's his- 
torical acts." Glorious New York has, from the 
beginning of her career down to the present hour, 

and of the steps that led to it, on both sides of the Atlantic, was 
sadly marred, and shamefully mutilated. My authority is from 
my late venerable friend John Adams, the President of these 
United States, who perused Gordon's manuscript when he was our 
Minister at the Court of London, and from my own knowledge, 
having been shown a considerable portion of the History before 
the author left this country to die in his own, and having corre- 
sponded with Mm till near the close of his long life." 



FKENCH REVOLUTION. 115 

ever been the theatre of thouglit, of action, and 
of results, and so I presume she is to continue. 
Her adventurous character has rendered her the 
acknowledged pioneer of the Republic, and her 
thousand examples of improved policy in muni- 
cipal aifairs, in building, in domestic economy, in 
the several departments of arts and of commerce, 
have yielded by their adoption blessings untold to 
other cities of the Union. From the time of that 
great improvement, as it was called, the construc- 
tion of side walks for foot passengers in the streets, 
only one hundred and thirty-four years after the 
streets themselves were first paved, (a long Rip 
Van Winkle torpor,) at which service we find Pin- 
tard struggled with the corporate authorities in 
1791-2, down to that mighty achievement, the in- 
troduction of the Croton water, by the genius of 
Douglass, she has bSen the exemplar for other 
cities of the Republic, and approved by the en- 
lightened foreigner, from every nation, who has 
visited our shores. 

Common observation has repeatedly confirmed 
the fact, that the greatest and the smallest events 
are often synchronous. With the birth of the 
Revolution of France in 1789, I made my first 
appearance on this planet ; and the arrival of 
TEmbuscade four years after, from the notoriety 
of the event and its consequences, enables me to 
bring to feeble recollection many of the scenes 



116 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

whicli transpired in this city at that time : the 
popular excitement and bustle, the liberty cap, 
the entree of citizen Genet, the Red Cockade, the 
song of the carmagnole, in which with childish 
ambition I united, the rencontre with the Boston 
frigate, and the commotion arising from Jay's 
treaty. Though I cannot speak earnestly from 
actual knowledge, we must all concede that these 
were the times when political strife assumed a for- 
midable aspect, when the press most flagrantly 
outraged indi\ddual rights and domestic peace — 
when the impugners of the Washington admin- 
istration received new weapons with which to 
inflict their assaults U23on tried patriotism, by 
every arrival from abroad, announcing France in 
her progress. The federalists and the anti-federal- 
ists now became the federal and the republican 
party ; the carmagnole sung every hour of every 
day in the streets, ajid on stated days at the Bel- 
videre Club House, fanned the embers and en- 
kindled that zeal which caused the overthrow of 
many of the soundest principles of American free- 
dom. Even the yellow fever, which from its 
novelty and its malignancy struck terror in every 
bosom, and was rendered more lurid by the absurd 
preventive means of burning tar and tar barrels in 
almost every street, afforded no mitigation of party 
animosity, and Greenleaf with his Argus, Freneau 
with his Time Piece, and Cobbett with his Porcu- 



FEDERAL AND REPUBLICAN PARTIES. 117 

pine Gazette, increased the consternation wliich 
only added to the inquietude of the peaceable citi- 
zen, who had often reasoned within himself, that a 
seven years' carnage, through which he had passed, 
had been enough for one life. The arrogance of 
party-leaders was alike acrimonious toward their 
opponents, and reasoning on every side seemed 
equally nugatory. Nor could Tammany, ostensibly 
the patron saint of aboriginal antiquities, calm 
the multitudinous waves of faction, though her 
public processions were decorated with the insignia 
of the calumet, and the song of peace was chanted 
in untold strains, accompanied by the Goddess of 
Liberty with discolored countenance and Indian 
trappings ; and patriotic citizens, such as Josiah 
Ogden Hoffman, Cadwallader D. ColdcD, and 
William Mooney, as sachems, with many others, 
followed in her train. 

I have not the rashness to invade the chair on 
which is seated with so much national benefit and 
renown the historian Bancroft, or approach the 
sphere of the historical orator of the nation, Ed- 
ward Everett ; still, as your association is historical 
in all its aims, I shall present a few additional 
circumstances which signalized the spirit of those 
memorable times in New York. Much I saw — 
much has been told me by the old inhabitants, now 
departed. When the entire American nation, nay, 
when the civilized world at large seemed electrified 



118 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

by the outbreak of the revolution of France, it 
necessarily followed, as the shadow does the sub- 
stance, that the American soul, never derelict, 
could not but enkindle with patriotic warmth at 
the cause of that people, whose loftiest desire was 
freedom ; of that people who themselves had, with 
profuse appropriation, enabled that very bosom, in 
the moment of hardest trial, to inhale the air of 
liberty. Successive events had now dethroned the 
monarchy of France, and the democratic spirit was 
now evolved in its fullest element. It was not 
surprising that the experienced and the sober 
champions who had effected the great revolution 
of the Colonies should now make the cause of 
struggling France their own ; and as victors al- 
ready in one desperate crisis, they seemed ready to 
enter into a new contest for the rights of man. The 
masses coalesced and co-operated. Cheering pros- 
pects of sympathy and of support were held out in 
the prospective to their former friends and bene- 
factors abroad. Jealousy of Britain, affection for 
France, was now the prevailing impulse, and the 
business of the day was often interrupted by tu- 
multuous noises in the streets. Groups of sailors 
might be collected on the docks and at the ship- 
ping ready to embark on a voyage of plunder ; 
merchants and traders in detached bodies might be 
seen discussing the hazards of commerce ; the 
schools liberated from their prescribed hours of 



RIVINGTON AND GAINE. 119 

study, because of some fresh report of tlie Ambus- 
cade or of Genet, the schoolmaster uttering in his 
dismissal a new reason for the study of the classics, 
by expounding with oracular dignity to his scholars, 
Vivat Respuhlica, now broadly printed as the cap- 
tion of the play-bill or the pamphlet just issued. 
The crew of the French frigate moored off Peck 
Shp were now disgorged on shore, and organized 
to march in file, increased by many natives, bear- 
ing the liberty cap with reverence, to the residence 
of the French Consul, in Water street, and thence 
proceeding to the Bowling Green, patriotically to 
root out, by paving stones thrown in showers, the 
debris of the old statue of George III. The tri- 
color was in every hand or affixed to every w^atch- 
chain, while from every lip was vociferated the 
carmagnole. Meanwhile the two old notorious 
arch-tories, w^ho had fattened on lies and libels, 
and before whose doors the procession passed, 
were snugly ensconced behind their shop counter ; 
Eivington in rich purple velvet coat, full wig and 
cane, and ample frills, dealing out good stationery 
to his customers ; and Gaine, in less ostentatious 
costume, ready with religious zeal to dispose of his 
recent edition of the Book of Common Prayer to 
all true worshippers. 

PoHtical clubs abounded everywhere. The 
fraternity of the two nations was the great theme. 
They deliberated on the doctrine of Lafayette in 



120 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

the national Assembly — " When oppression ren- 
ders a revolution necessary, insurrection is the most 
sacred of duties." The democratic principle as- 
sumed a more vigorous form, and the Democratic 
Society, the first in this city, and perhaps the first 
in the Union, was organized, with Henry Kutgers, 
an affluent and distinguished citizen, as its presi- 
dent. 

But the time was near at hand when this flood 
in revolutionary affairs was about to find its ebb, 
so far as concerned the universal sympathy whicli 
America had cherished for struggling France. She 
had contemplated the overthrow of the monarchy, 
the destruction of the privileged orders, the execu- 
tion of the king, with more or less approval ; and, 
from the freedom of the press, and the diffusion of 
knowledge, our citizens were perhaps as copiously 
enlightened in the transactions of Paris as most of 
the inhabitants of that capital in the midst of all 
its doings. But fresher and still more portentous 
intelligence now poured in among us. All knew 
that the tree of liberty had been planted in human 
blood ; yet the delights at its growth were some- 
times checked by the means of its nutrition. Nor 
was this virtiginous state of public opinion long to 
last. Some of the hitherto most factious and sturdy 
Jacobinical advocates took alarm at the rapid 
march of foreign events. In the public assemblies 
graver deliberations filled the speaker's mind, and 



FANATICAL TIMES GENET. 121 

the fulminations of anarchy gave way to the per- 
suasive logic of rule and right. History was now, 
indeed^ teaching philosophy. So far as concerned 
the war itself, nothing abroad so effectively chilled 
the ardor of the American people as the sanguinary 
measures of Robespierre, while at home the ex- 
traordinary career of Genet increased the dissatis- 
faction to the cause of Republican France, and 
added to the anxiety which the predominance of 
Jacobinical principles might occasion. 

Amidst these momentous events, others scarcely 
less alarming were seen approaching, aggravated 
by the rebellious tendencies of foreign interference 
and the mahgn career of Genet, '•'•■ the lawless spirit 
of the times, and the increase of popular disaffec- 

* I have spoken of Genet with severity : he labors under re- 
proach by every historian who has recorded his deeds, and by 
none is he more chastised than by Judge Marshall ; yet withal, 
Genet possessed a kindly nature, was exuberant in speech, of live- 
ly parts, and surcharged with anecdotes. His intellectual culture 
was considerable ; he was master of several living languages, a 
proficient in music as well as a skilful performer. To a remark I 
made to him touching his execution on the piano, he subjoined : 
"I have given many hours daily for twelve years to this instru- 
ment, and now reach some effective sounds." He had a genius 
for mechanics, and after he had become an agriculturist in this 
country, wrote on machinery and on husbandry. He assured me 
(in 1812) the time would arrive when his official conduct as min- 
ister would be cleared of its dark shades. To other shoulders, 
said he, will be transferred the odium I now bear. In a conver- 
sation with him on the vicissitudes and events of the French Re- 
volution, he said, " Their leaders were novices : had thev been 

6 



122 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

tion towards England. The appointment of Jay 
as minister extraordinary to Great Britain, the 
debates in Congress on the Treaty which he had 
negotiated, and the local turmoil which found en- 
couragement elsewhere' as well as in this city, are 
facts strongly within the memory of the venerable 
men still alive among us. As might be inferred, 
the provisions of the treaty were assailed with 
the greatest vehemence by Jacobinical or demo- 
cratic clubs, and the disciples of the most spotless 
of patriots decried in language which can scarcely 
find a parallel in the vocabulary of abuse. The 
disorganizing multitude, segregated in divers parts 
of the town, soon found a rallying point at the 
Bowling Green, opposite to the Government House, 
and signalized themselves by burning a copy of 
the Treaty amidst the wildest shrieks of demoniac 
fiiry, — while some of the Livingstons, (among 
whom the most grateful associations clustered for 
revolutionaiy services in behalf of dear America,) 
with more than thoughtless efPronter}^ fanned the 
embers of discontent, and William S. Smith (a 
son-in-law of old President Adams) presided with 

versed in Albany politics but for three months, we would have es- 
caped many trials, and our patriotism been crowned with better 
results." It is to be regretted that the papers of Genet have not 
yet seen the light : they embrace letters from Voltaire and Rous- 
seau, and years of correspondence with eminent American states- 
men, down to the close of his eventful life. He died at Jamaica, 
Long Island, in 1834, aged 71 years. 



jay's treaty. 123 

magisterial importance at a formidable meeting 
of the malcontents, wlio passed resolutions depre- 
catoiy of the stipulations of the negotiation and 
of the principles and acts espoused by the advo- 
cates of the great measure. To give a still more 
alarming aspect to affairs, Hamilton and Kufus 
King, occupying the balcony of the City Hall, in 
Wall street, and addressing the people in accents 
of friendship and peace and reconcihation, were 
treated in return by showers of stones levelled at 
their persons by the exasperated mob gathered in 
front of that building. ^' These are hard arguments 
to encounter," exclaimed the noble-hearted Hamil- 
ton. Edward Livingston, (afterwards so celebrated 
for his Louisianian Code,) was, I am informed, 
one of this violent number. What Washington 
called* a counter-current, however, actually took 
place at a meeting of the old Chamber of Com- 
merce, at the head of which was Comfort Sands, 
an experienced man who had been long before a 
member of the Committee of Safety in the days of 
the Liberty Boys. This important body on trade 
and commerce voted resolutions declaring their ap- 
probation of the treaty. But let me refer you to 
the history of that time-honored association writ- 
ten by Charles King, LL. D., for further par- 
ticulars. 

I believe old Tammany was then too intent in 
effecting their original design, with their charter 



124 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

before them, of gathering together the relics of na- 
ture, art, beads, wampum, tomahawks, belts, 
earthen jugs and pots, and other Indian antiqui- 
ties, with all that could be found of Indian litera- 
ture in war songs, and hieroglyphical barks, to 
take any special movement in this crisis of public 
solicitude for the safety of the Union. Tammany, 
to her honor, adhered together by a strong con- 
servative Americanism, and stood aloof from the 
influence of foreign contamination. That these 
assertions are founded on more than conjecture, 
is deducible from contemporaneous events. One 
of the beloved idols among their members, was the 
erudite Dr. Samuel Latham Mitchill. Early after 
the organization of the Society, he discoursed be- 
fore the Society of Black Friars, on the character 
of St. Tammany, the Incas of Peru, and the be- 
nignant aspect of our Eepublic. Nothing had 
reference to our domestic trials. Still later, at a 
season of much agitation among us, as Sachem, 
in another address on the Ked Man of the New- 
World, he congratulated the members on their 
patron saint, with the hope that their squaws and 
papooses were all well. 

Public opinion, as I have already intimated, had 
become somewhat doubtful as to the wisdom which 
marked the French revolution. Many, once seem- 
ingly secure in the light of nature alone, now felt 
themselves led into a delusion, the results of which 



SKEPTICAL DOCTRINES. 125 

threatened more than temporal inconvenience. 
The middle and the best classes of society, the 
responsible citizen, who had at one time frater- 
nized with these apostles of liberty, now foresaw 
that certain doctrines ingrafted on and interwoven 
with the political dogmas of the day, were more 
serious in their intent than avowed, and penetrated 
deeper into the inward parts than the stripes of 
partisan leaders and the acts of military chieftains. 
Equivocation only rendered more noxious the skep- 
ticism which was too prominently rearing its head. 
Few were so blind as not to see that infidelity, 
wrapt in the mantle of the sovereign rights of the 
people, indulged the hope of her triumphant es- 
tablishment, and the downfall of the strongest 
pillars of the Christian faith. 

As the darkness which had shrouded the actual 
state of things broke away, new hght shone upon 
the conduct of the revolutionists. A devouter 
feeling was in progress, and circumstances were 
better comprehended. The Gospel of charity, of 
peace, and of good will to all men, it was safely 
inferred, was not to be advanced by existing trans- 
actions, nor its dignity elucidated with advantage 
by the foulest blasphemies. It was further seen 
that the pestilential exhalations of Paris had not 
merely polluted all France, but that they had 
widely diffused themselves throughout the Con- 
tinent ; that Germany had her Illuminati ; that 



126 HISTOKICAL DISCOUKSE. 

England breathed the noxious vapor with spas- 
modic vehemence ; that Scotland was tainted ; 
that Ireland was ready for a change of elemental 
life. 

Enough had now transpired abroad to awaken 
alarm at home. New York, w^hich, to her ever- 
lasting honor be it said, had been founded and 
reared under her original settlers, the Dutch, and 
with the exception of some slight misrule on the 
part of certain of her English masters (see our 
faithful and distinguished historian Brodhead ''••'), 
had uniformly sustained religious toleration down 
to the present moment ; New York, which had 
with the nobleness of freemen looked with sym- 
pathizing eyes on revolutionary France in her in- ' 
cipient warfare on behalf of a persecuted and 
trodden-down nation, could no longer continue in- 
credulous as to the mischief and abuse which 
afflicted others, or skeptical as to the disorder 
and moral degradation which threatened even her 
own domestic fireside. 

" A change came o'er the spirit of her dream." 

I have said already that her revolutionary 
heroes wavered in their hopes that our people 
were swayed by anticipated benefits ; that the 

* History of the State of New York : by John Romejn Brod- 
head. First period, 1609-1664. New York : Harper & Brothers, 
8vo., 1853. 



ATHEISTICAL TIMES. 127 

political clubs took alarm ; in sliort, among men 
of all orders and professions, Doubting Castle 
stood before them. Liberty, the attractive god- 
dess, once decorated in her robes of resplendent 
purity, was now transformed into a hideous mon- 
strosity. The professing Christians stood aghast 
when they learned that in France every tenth day 
was appointed for the Sabbath ; that death was 
pronounced an eternal sleep ; that it was resolved 
by the Corresponding Society of Paris that the 
belief of a God was so pernicious an opinion, as 
to be an exception to the general principle of toler- 
ation. The clergy, with us, could no longer with- 
stand these atrocious sentiments. " Better,'" said 
they, " abandon the cause of liberty, so dear to 
our humanity, than adhere to it at such a sac- 
rilegious cost. Better abandon France than aban- 
don our God.'' The balance was struck, and 
many of that exalted order of men who had been 
the advocates of the revolution, were now turned 
and became its most implacable enemies. The 
Kev. John McKnight, a professor in Columbia 
College, fortified by the patriotic Witherspoon, 
had issued a series of Discourses on Faith, and 
William Linn, of the Collegiate Dutch Church, 
an eminent divine and accomplished preacher, was 
of the number of the converts. He had published 
the Signs of the Times in behalf of Liberty and 
France ; his troubled bosom now gave relief to 



128 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

itself by his Discourse on National Sins. The 
Yoice of Warning, a powerful Discourse by a pop- 
ular man, John M. Mason, was also widely circu- 
lated. The party feuds which had annoyed real 
believers of different denominations on such points 
as adult and paedo-baptism, on certain rituals, on 
ordination and the like, and which had hitherto 
been the only obstacle to the more earnest and 
greater extension of religious conformity by the 
clergy of different sects, were apprehended now as 
merely nothing, in comparison to the evils which 
seemed impending. The tranquillity of the whole 
clerical body stood on the borders of destruction. 
The prelacy was alarmed, and the so-called dis- 
senters of every faith were ill at ease. They had 
felt the whirlwind, they now dreaded the storm. 
The wolf threatened to destroy both the shepherd 
and his flock. The pulpit, so often and so effec- 
tively the means of rehef of private sorrow, now 
waged uncompromising war with her thunderbolts 
from heaven, to rescue that only precious book, as 
Mason called the Bible, from the consuming influ- 
ence of atheism. 

I am not to measure the extent of the benefits 
conferred by the ministry at that dark time when 
ominous formalities in the streets awakened the 
public gaze, when the ears were distracted by ter- 
rible blasphemy, and folly and infidelity had 
reached their climax ; but when I know that that 



MINISTERIAL EFFORTS. 129 

majestic father of theology, Dr. Livingston^ of the 
Dutch Keformed Church, Dr. Eodgers and Dr. John 
M. Mason, of the Presbyterian community ; that 
learned dignitary of the Episcopate, Bishop Pro- 
voost ; John Foster, of the Baptists ; Francis 
Asbuiy, of the Methodists, and Kunze of the Ger- 
man Lutheran Church, were of the number, and 
were enumerated among the best of men who en- 
countered the times and openly declared their 
faith, in order to rescue the people from them- 
selves ; I feel bound to infer that some of the 
lepers must have been cleansed. That eyesight 
was not received by all, and the scoffers not alto- 
gether silenced, the history of that period gives us 
painful proofs. That you may understand me the 
better, I will weary your patience a moment longer 
with a few circumstances which fell under the 
observation of every attentive person at that pe- 
riod. Nor will you accuse me of invective while I 
recite the story. 

I believe it is set down as a political axiom 
that war is not conducive to the progress of re- 
ligious behef. Be this as it may, our revolutionary 
contest in its wide-spread desolation had left the 
institutions of learning and of theology encom- 
passed with perils and in the lowest temporal con- 
dition. Time was requisite to restore their ability 
and their influence ; and ecclesiastical affairs ne- 
cessarily halted in their march, from the penury 
6* 



130 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

which pervaded the country and the overburdened 
cares of a people, full of gratitude at their liber- 
ation from the yoke of tyranny, yet hardly ready 
to summon the requisite means for such important 
and graA^e ends. In the meanwhile, the conclusion 
must be made that a sprinkling of philosophical 
belief, in contradistinction to that of religious, had 
here and there penetrated the public mind and 
entered the soil of liberty, derived from the already 
scattered circulation of the writings of Voltaire, 
Helvetius, Rousseau, and the Encyclo]D£edists. 
But the land was doomed to be still deeper im- 
pregnated and the dwellers thereon to partake in 
larger bounty of the products of a new husbandry, 
the fruits of a new revelation, in the enjoyment of 
which nature, rejecting absurdities and rejoicing in 
a higher knowledge, would understand her own 
powers and assert her inherent dignity. The work 
was therefore not entirely abortive, when, upon the 
arrival of the Ambuscade within our waters, was 
also brought that material which constructed the 
Temple of Reason and led numerous worship]3ers 
to her shrine. The Theophilanthropists reared 
their heads, and Deistical Clubs were in formative 
operation. However repellent to the doctrines of 
a religion which, with uprightness of intention and 
the deepest conviction, the people at large main- 
tained in conscious purity ; however antagonistic 
to that faith which they had in infancy been 



THEOPHILANTHKOPISTS. 131 

taught and in riper years cherished as their great- 
est blessing, their allegiance to the God of their 
fathers was nevertheless in many instances neu- 
tralized by the poison they imbibed, and in many 
cases broken asunder by pretexts of superior en- 
lightenment — a more tenable rationahty, the pride 
of intellect. That these philosophical teachers well 
comprehended the avenues of triumjoh over the 
human heart, is now understood better than in the 
days of their active labors. At that period of our 
city's growth, scholastic knowledge was but spar- 
ingly diffused among us, and the manageable mul- 
titude were easily led captive by the dexterity of 
Jacobinical instructors, who knew how to accom- 
modate their lessons to the affections of the unen- 
lightened and untaught. Besides which, liberty 
and the rights of man were so insidiously inter- 
woven with the fallacies of skepticism, that while 
the former vouchsafed the dearest privileges, the 
latter was so masked that numbers unawares were 
indoctrinated and became the disciples of the the- 
istical school. 

These clandestine movements were not without 
their consequences in other sections of the State, 
more especially at and about Newburgh, in the 
county of Orange. That county had been known 
as the residence of a fierce democracy for some 
time. It was patriotic in revolutionary times, and 
its political sentiments generally ran high. It was 



132 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

destined afterwards to become the scene of the 
Druidical Society, for so the free-thinkers nomi- 
nated their fraternity. They feigned the principles 
of the Illuminati and the Jacobin Ckibs ; their 
public avowal was liberty and the rights of man. 
They alternately conducted their public worship in 
New York and at Newburgh ; and at this latter 
place I have assurances that the typical symbols of 
Christianity were sometimes outrageously profaned, 
and the holy sacraments prostituted to the vilest 
ends. 

I might mention the names of several of the 
leading officials of this confederacy, were this the 
occasion — with a number of them I afterwards 
became well acquainted in my professional life. 
There were talents and knowledge among them, 
and an ardent thirst for liberty : they had warm 
feehngs, strong affections, but lacked the conser- 
vative and wholesome principles on which a re- 
public must depend for its j)rosperity and dura tion. 
I would draw a veil over the closing scenes of 
some of their lives. How often we behold a mys- 
tery ! The county which had given to Noah Web- 
ster the school-house in which he first imparted 
juvenile knowledge, and where he first concocted 
the famous Spelling-book which has since given 
instruction and morality to millions of the youth 
of both sexes of this nation, became in the pro- 
gress of events the patron of a society whose every 



AGE OF REASON. 133 

act seemed destined to demolisli those very princi- 
ples on which both liberty and life depend. 

In the midst of these commotions, certain 
presses were not tardy in the diffusion of works 
favoring the great designs of infidelity : Condorcet 
and Volney, Tindall and Boulanger, became ac- 
cessible in libraries and circulated widely by pur- 
chase. But no work had a demand for readers at 
all comparable to that of Paine ; and it is a fact 
almost incredible that the Age of Keason, on its 
first appearance in this city, was printed as an or- 
thodox book, by orthodox publishers, of a house 
of orthodox faith, doubtless deceived by the vast 
renown which the author of Common Sense had 
obtained, and the prospects of sale ; acting on the 
principle given in the Cyclopaedia, in its definition 
of a good book, in booksellers' language, " one 
that sells well." The same publishers, however, 
made early atonement for their bibliographical 
error, in their immense circulation of Watson's 
Apology. 

We had in those days other commotions touch- 
ing articles of belief of another order of delusion. 
I mean the promulgation of the rhapsodies of 
Bichard Brothers, who affirmed he had received a 
special gift, and who in England had aroused 
attention by his revelations and prophetic visions 
not altogether unlike those of the Millerites of the 
other day in this metropolis. David Austin, an 



134 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

ardent preacher, of New Jersey, came hither to 
our relief, and occupying a prominent pulpit de- 
nounced Brothers as a deceiver, imparting his own 
learned disquisitions on the millennium ; while 
Townley, a worthy man and laborious expositor, 
the last in the city of that denomination of 
preachers of the old Oliver Cromwell belief, in a 
neighboring edifice in Warren street was expound- 
ing the " unsearchable riches,'' and demonstrating 
the decrees of infinite wisdom by enlightening his 
audience with a burning candle on his desk, in 
which I observed he protruded his finger in order 
to elucidate that passage of holy writ, ^^ when thou 
walkest in the fire, thou shalt not be consumed, 
and the flame shall not burn thee." 

The great instrument in the promotion of 
deistical doctiines during that singular period in 
New York, was Elihu Palmer, a speaker of much 
earnestness, whose pulmonary apparatus gave force 
to a deep, sonorous, and emphatic utterance. He 
was a native of Connecticut, born in 1763, was 
graduated at Dartmouth College, brought up a 
Congregationalist — assumed the ministry, but after 
a short period was suddenly transformed into a 
Deist. In his study he was reading the psalm, 
paraphrased by Watts, " Lord, I am vile, conceived 
in sin.'' He doubted, he denied the declaration ; 
he abandoned preaching. Kiker, in his valuable 
Annals of Newtown, gives an interesting detail of 



ELIHU PALMER. 135 

the circumstances. Palmer proceeded to Phila- 
delphia for the purpose of the study and practice 
of the law, took the yellow fever of 1793, became 
totally blind, and gave up his law pursuits. He 
now in right earnestness assumed the function of 
a deistical preacher in this city, in 1796. He died 
in Philadelphia of pleurisy, in the winter of 1805 
or 1806. In what manner he added to the stores 
of his wisdom after his loss of sight, I know not ; 
but must infer that his associate followers became 
in turns readers to him. His information, from 
early inquiry and a strong love of knowledge, with 
the means referred to, secured to him the title of 
a man of parts ; such was the general reputation 
he bore. I have more than once listened to 
Palmer ; none could be weary within the sound 
of his voice ; his diction was classical ; and much 
of his natural theology attractive by variety of 
illustration. But admiration often sunk into de- 
spondency at his assumption, and his sarcastic 
assaults on things most holy. His boldest philippic 
was his discourse on the title-page of the Bible, in 
which, with the double shield of jacobinism and 
infidelity, he warned rising America against con- 
fidence in a book authorized by the monarchy of 
England, and inveighed against royalty and the 
treacherous James, with at least equal zeal as did 
that sensualist issue his Counterblast against the 
most innocent recreation that falls within the 



136 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

scope of weary mortals. Palmer delivered his 
sermons in the Union Hotel, in William street. 
His audience was composed of a large body of the 
free-thinkers of that day. His Principles of Na- 
ture, a 12mo, was reprinted in London about 
the time of the Thistlewood riots. Palmer's 
strongest personal friends were John Pellowes, 
an author of some volumes ; Kose, an unfortunate 
lawyer ; Taylor, a philanthropist, and Charles 
Christian. 

During the later years of his pastoral func- 
tions, as he called them, he was aided by a co- 
laborer in another part of the city, of physical 
proportions even more stately, of still more daring 
speech, whose voice was as the surge of mighty 
billows, whose jacobinism was, if possible, still 
fiercer ; I allude to John Foster : I have heard 
many speakers, but none whose voice ever equalled 
the volume of Foster's. It flowed with delicious 
ease, and yet penetrated every where. He besides 
was favored with a noble presence. Points of dif- 
ference existed in the theological dogmas of Fos- 
ter and Palmer, yet they had the same ends in 
view ; radicalism and the spread of the Jaco- 
binical element. Foster's exordium consisted gen- 
erally in an invocation to the goddess of liberty, 
now unshackled, who inhaled nutrition from 
heaven, seated on her throne of more than Alpine 
heights. Palmer and Foster called each other 



THOMAS PAINE. 137 

brother, and tlie fraternity was most cordial. I 
Lave sometimes thought, could we find more fre- 
quently the same strenuous efforts, as these men 
employed, called into action by that exalted order 
of persons whose aim is the diffusion of evangelical 
truth, we should also find a wider extension of the 
gospel dispensation. Methinks there is a de- 
ficiency somewhere : 

" 'Tis of ourselves that we are thus or thus : 
Our bodies are our gardens, to the which 
Our minds are gardeners." 

The improved temporal condition of our houses 
of worship in this city, after the war of indepen- 
dence, their great numerical increase, with the 
higher culture and augmented zeal of the preach- 
ers of different denominations in Christian exhor- 
tation, produced, if I may be allowed the lan- 
guage, a more formidable and well-disciphned 
phalanx against the inroads of infidel doctrines, 
and the front of deism was now less obtrusive, 
when the notorious author of the Age of Reason 
arrived among us in 1802. Nevertheless, his pro- 
digious political renown secured him vast atten- 
tions. The press on every side, from the north to 
the south, was filled with the highest eulogies of his 
merits and his services, or with direct invectives 
on his character. He was once the strong arm on 
which, in its darkest hour, the revolted colonies 



138 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

depended^ and lie had become the reviler of re- 
vealed truth and of the immaculate Washington. 
Jefferson, who had proved his friend, for reasons 
not necessary here to specify, was doomed to re- 
ceive a full share-of the vituperation heaped on 
Paine. But Paine had many friends ; and, as he 
ihere sought retirement rather than office, and felt 
that as he had vindicated the rights of man, he 
was able to protect his own, seemed indifferent 
to public censure, and preserved the vials of his 
indignation almost solely for the head of Gouver- 
neur Morris, to w^hom he had long owed a grudge. 
In his Letters to the People of the United States, 
his shafts of ridicule were repeatedly aimed at the 
great statesman who had penned the Constitu- 
tion. Morris, who, unfortunately for himself, had 
suffered amputation of a limb, rendered necessary 
by an accident, was made the subject by Paine of 
sarcastic remarks from his calamity ; and Paine, 
triumphing in the fact, assured the public that 
Morris was little to be depended upon in serious 
difficulties with other nations, inasmuch as in 
such a crisis he would not dare to show a leg. He 
often treated the physical infirmities of his oppo- 
nents as he treated the miracles recorded in Scrip- 
ture. Penury pleaded most successfully with his 
feelings, and from the abundance of anecdotes 
concerning him, he seems to have been generous 
when his means allowed him. A sorry author, 



THOMAS PAINE. 139 

while Paine was abroad, had fabricated a book 
which he vended advantageously among us, as the 
Recantation of Paine's Religious Creed. He was 
desirous, upon Paine's arrival, of a personal intro- 
duction to him, which was accordingly allowed. 
"Are you not, sir," said Paine to the stranger, 
" the writer of my Recantation ? Did you do 
well with the affair as a business transaction ? " 
An affirmative being given to both interrogatories, 
" I am glad," rejoined Paine, " you found the ex- 
23edient a successful shift for your needy family ; 
but write no more concerning Thomas Paine ; I 
am satisfied with your acknowledgment — try some- 
thing more worthy of a man." 

Paine's writings, it is well known, were gene- 
rally the promptings of special occasions. The 
yellow fever of 1803 brought out in 1804 his 
slender pamphlet on the causes of the pestilence. 
Some masonic agitations led shortly after to his 
History of the Origin of Masonry. His pen was 
rarely idle for the first year or two after his return 
to America, nor were the deplorable habits which 
marked his closing years so firmly fixed. Like the 
opium-eater, inspired by his narcotic, Paine, when 
he took pen in hand, demanded the brandy-bottle, 
and the rapidity of his composition seemed almost 
an inspiration. During the first few years after 
his return, he was often joined in his walks about 
town by some of our most enlightened citizens in 



140 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

social conversation, and his countenance bore tlie 
intellectual traces of Komney's painting. He now 
too received occasional invitations to dine with the 
choicer spirits of the democracy ; and none could 
surpass him in the social circle, from the abun- 
dance of his varied knowledge and his vivid imagi- 
nation. The learned and bulky Dr. Nicholas Ko- 
mayne had solicited his company at a dinner, to 
which also he invited Pintard, and other intelli- 
gent citizens, who had known Paine in revolution- 
ary days. Pintard chose this occasion to express 
to Paine his opinion of his infidel writings. " I 
have read and re-read,'' said Pintard, " your Age 
of Keason, and any doubts which I before enter- 
tained of the truth of revelation, have been re- 
moved by your logic. Yes, sir, your very argu- 
ments against Christianity have convinced me of 
its truth.'' " Well, then," answered Paine, with 
a sarcastic glance, " I may return to my couch to- 
night with the consolation that I have made at 
least one Christian." 

The plaster-cast of the head and features of 
Paine, now preserved in the gallery of arts of the 
Historical Society, is remarkable for its fidelity to 
the original, at the close of his Hfe. Jarvis, the 
painter, thought it his most successful work in 
that fine of occupation, and I can confirm the 
opinion from my many opportunities of seeing 
Paine. Paine, like Burr, towards the close of his 



THOMAS PAINE. 141 

earthly career, was subjected to the annoyance of 
repeated removals of his residence in New York ; 
and as time proved, even death did not secure 
repose for his mortal remains at New Rochelle. 

A singular coincidence led me to pay a visit 
to Cobbett, at his country seat, within a couple of 
miles of the city, on the island, on the very day 
that he had exhumed the bones of Paine, and 
shipped them for England. I will here repeat the 
words I used on a late occasion, and which Cob- 
bett gave utterance to at the friendly interview 
our party had with him. " I have just performed 
a duty, gentlemen, which has been too long de- 
layed : you have neglected too long the remains of 
Thomas Paine. I have done mj^self the honor to 
disinter his bones. I have removed them from 
New Rochelle. I have dug them up ; they are 
now on their way to England. When I myself 
return, I shall cause them to speak the common 
sense of the great man ; I shall gather together 
the people of Liverpool and Manchester in one 
assembly with those of London, and those bones 
will effect the reformation of England in Church 
and State." The result of Cobbett's experiment 
is not forgotten. — Paine created so much history, 
that it seems but justice that a brief notice of the 
man should find a few lines in a discourse on his- 
torical matters. The moral and the refined may 
think that more than is needful has already been 



142 HISTOEICAL DISCOURSE. 

said concerning Paine, arguing that the corrup- 
tions of his advanced life outweighed the patriotic 
benefits of his earher career. The principle of 
gratitude will not, however, allow a genuine spirit 
to forget the magical influence once wrought by 
his Common Sense over the millions who read it 
at the most critical moment in the nation's story. 
He fell, low indeed in process of time, from his 
high estate, and I have not been indifi*erent in sift- 
ing the accounts by his visitors of his loathsome hab- 
its, and his coarse jests with things sacred. Cheet- 
ham, who with settled malignity wrote the life of 
Paine, though he himself had long been in famihar 
intercourse with the deistical clubs, felt little desire 
to extenuate any of the faults in Paine' s charac- 
ter. I have a suspicion that sinister motives of a 
pohtical nature were not overlooked by the biogra- 
pher. He was wont in his editorial career to seize 
upon circumstances which might effectually turn 
the tide of popular favor in his behalf He had 
done so with the tergiversations of Burr, he had 
done so with the renown of Hamilton ; he had 
done so in the case of Dewitt Clinton, and why 
not preserve his consistency in his strictures on 
the fruits of unbelief in the degradation of the 
wretched Paine ? Paine clung to his infidehty 
until the last moment of his natural life. His 
death-bed scene was a spectacle. He who in his 
early days had been associated with and had re- 



THE UNIVERSALISTS. 143 

ceived counsel from Franklin, was, in Hs old age, 
deserted by the humblest menial : he, whose pen 
had proved a very sword among nations, had 
shaken empires and made kings tremble, now 
yielded up the mastery to the most treacherous of 
monarchs. King Alcohol. 

There is much in the Historical Library con- 
cerning Paine, and not the least of value is the 
revised copy, for a second edition, of Cheetham's 
work, which he gave me for the institution. 

But the programme of our theological warfare 
in those remarkable times is not yet complete. 
While these scenes were enacting, there were other 
establishments not idle. The Society of Friends, 
peaceable as from the beginning, and devoted with 
characteristic benevolence to works of charity, held 
their service in the Pearl street and Liberty street 
meeting-houses ; not as yet disturbed by the inno- 
vations on primitive Barclay, introduced by Ehas 
Hicks, an able preacher of strong reasoning pow- 
ers, and which subsequently agitated that religious 
community from the city of their American origin 
through various States of the Union : yet, in the 
end, unavailable to suppress that inward comfort 
(as Penn calls it) " which leads the soul to silent 
converse with heaven, and prompts to acts of be- 
neficence for suffering mortals.'"* 

The Universalists, with Edward Mitchell and 
William Palmer, though circumscribed in fiscal 



144 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

means, nevertheless drew togetlier a most respect- 
able body of believers to their house of worship 
in Magazine street. They were both men of elo- 
quence and good pleaders in behalf of their tenets, 
and had large auditories. Occasionally they were 
sustained in the work of their conviction by the 
preaching of John Murray, an Englishman by 
birth, whose casual absence from his people in 
Massachusetts enabled him to gratify the disciples 
of their creed in New York. Murray had a rival 
of a like name to his own, of the Calvinistic faith, 
a man of sound erudition and rhetorical powers, 
and in contradistinction they were designated by 
the sobriquet Salvation and Damnation Murray. 
These men moved together so harmoniously, that 
they often alternately occupied the same pulpit, 
on the same day, in New England. The Univer- 
salist, little John Murray, had much of the primi- 
tive about him ; his rich hiunility, his grave ac- 
cent, and his commentaries on the divine love, 
won him distinction from every discourse. None 
could withhold a kindly approbation. He seemed 
to me always charged with tracts on benevolence, 
and engaged in distributing a periodical called the 
Berean, or Scripture Searcher. He called himself 
a Berean. 

The doctrines of the Universalists had been 
entertained and promulgated in New York and 
elsewhere among Americans, long prior to the time 



TOLEKATION. 145 

of the public discourses of Mitchell and Palmer. 
Chauncey's book had been read by thousands ; 
William Pitt Smith, a doctor of physic, and a 
professor of materia medica in Columbia College, 
in this city, had published his Letters of Amyntor ; 
Winchester's Lectures on Universal Restoration 
and on the Prophecies, had been circulated 
with a strong recommendatory letter from the 
pen of Dr. Rush ; and Huntington's Calvin- 
ism Improved, or the Gospel Illustrated as a Sys- 
tem of Real Grace issuing in the Salvation of all 
men, had gained much notoriety from the peculiar 
circumstances which accompanied its publication 
as a posthumous work, and the able reply to it by 
the celebrated Dr. Strong, of Hartford. We 
moreover had a slender volume on the same topic 
from a medical prescriber in this city, by the nan\e 
of Young. Seed therefore had been sown broad- 
cast, ere Edward Mitchell had mounted the pul- 
pit. Nevertheless, the Universalists may look 
back with equal emotions of gratitude at the 
labors of Mitchell and Palmer for a series of years 
in their service, begun some fifty years ago, while 
their society was in its infancy, as at the present 
day they hail their accomplished orator, Dr. Chapin, 
as their ecclesiastical leader. 

What a beautiful and instructive example of 
toleration is set forth in this brief history of creeds 
and forms of belief ! During the whole of this 



146 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

critical period of tlie war of belief and unbelief 
in reliffious matters, I never learned, that the least 
commotion ever disturbed public tranquillity. It 
waSj indeed, occasionally otherwise in political 
affairs ; but we look in vain for occurrences simi- 
lar to those which disfigured the days of our 
colonial vassalage under the reign of that royal 
vagabond, Cornbury, and some of his successors. 
Such was the homage paid to the Declaration of 
Independence. 

I had the opportunity, in the Magazine street 
church, of listening to a discourse full of personal 
observation and reminiscences, from the lips of 
Stewart, the Walking Philosopher, as the books 
call him ; a man of altitude, whose inferior limbs 
provided him with peculiar facilities to visit almost 
every part of the earth as a pedestrian, before we 
had railways, and who enlightened his audience- 
with descriptive touches of Egypt and her pyra- 
mids, of Nova Zembla, "and the Lord knows 
where." I shall never forget his unostentatious, 
though impressive appearance ; his lank figure, his 
long neck, his long nose, his wide mouth, and his 
broad white hat. 

There is one other subject I must place within 
the background of this picture of past times, and 
that is street preaching. The older inhabitants 
tell us we had much of it in the earlier condition 
of this city, shortly after the inauguration of the 



LORENZO DOW. 147 

first President of the United States. 1 remember 
well repeated examples of tliis sort of edification 
in the public ways. I shall specify but one, and 
that was to be found in the person of Lorenzo Dow. 
Dow was a Wesleyan, of rare courage and deter- 
mined zeal. He scarcely ever presented himself 
without drawing together large multitudes of 
hearers, in part owing to his grotesque appear- 
ance, but not a little arising from his dexterous 
elocution and his prompt vocabulary. He was 
faithful to his mission, and a benefactor to 
Methodism in that day. His weapons against 
Beelzebub were providential interpositions, won- 
drous disasters, touching sentiments, miraculous 
escapes, something after the method of John 
Bunyan. His religious zeal armed him with 
Christian forbearance, while his convictions al- 
lowed him a justifiable use of the strongest flagel- 
lations for besetting sins. Sometimes you were 
angered by his colloquial vulgarity ; but he never 
descended so low as Huntington, the sinner saved, 
the blasphemous coal-heaver of England. He 
was rather a coarse edition on brown paper, with 
battered type, of Rowland Hill. Like the disci- 
plined histrionic performer, he often adjusted him- 
self to adventitious circumstances ; in his field ex- 
ercises, at camp meetings, and the like, a raging 
storm might be the forerunner of God's immediate 
wrath ; a change of elements might betoken Para- 



148 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

dise restored, or a new Jerusalem. He might be- 
come farcical or funereal. He had genius at all 
times to construct a catastrophe. His apparent 
sincerity and his indubitable earnestness sustained 
and carried him onward, while many ran to and 
fro. Repartee, humor, wit, irony, were a portion 
of his stock in trade, the materials he adroitly 
managed. Sometimes he was redundant in love 
and the aifections, at other times acrimonious and 
condemnatory. Altogether Lorenzo was an orig- 
inal, and a self-sustained man, and would handle 
more than the rhetorician^s tools. His appearance 
must have occasionally proved a drawback to his 
argument, but he was resolute and heroic. His 
garments, like his person, seemed to have little to 
do with the detersive influence of cleanliness. 
With dishevelled locks of black flowing hair over 
his shoulders, like Edward Irving of many tongues, 
and a face which, like the fashion of our own day, 
rarely ever knew a razor, his piercing gray eyes of 
rapid mobility, infiltrated with a glabrous moist- 
ure, rolled with a keen perception, and was the 
frequent index of his mental armory. I have 
implied that he was always ready at a rejoinder ; 
an instance or two may be given. A dissenter 
from Dow's Arminian doctrines, after listening to 
his harangue, asked him if he knew what Calvin- 
ism was ? " Yes," he promptly replied : — 



LORENZO DOW. 149 

* You can and you can't, 

You will and you won't ; 
Youll be damned if you do, 

And you'll be damned if you don't.' 

That, sir, is Calvinism, something more than 
rhyme." I, who have rarely left New York for a 
day during the past fifty years, (save my year 
abroad,) was in the summer of 1824 at Utica with 
a patient. It so happened that Dow, at that very 
time, held forth in an adjacent wood, having for his 
audience some of the Oneida and Eeservation In- 
dians, with a vast assemblage of the people of Utica 
and the neighboring villages. Mounted on an ad- 
vantageous scaffolding, he discoursed on the re- 
wards of a good life, and pictured the blessings of 
heaven. Upon his return to the hotel there was 
found among the occujoants a Mr. Branch and old 
General Koot, so familiarly known for the oppro- 
brious name of " the Big Ditch," which he gave 
to CHnton's Canal. These two gentlemen ad- 
dressed Dow, told him they had heard him say 
much of heaven, and now begged to ask him if 
he could describe the place. " Yes," says Dow, 
with entire ease. " Heaven is a wide and expan- 
sive region, a beautiful plain, something like our 
prairie country — without any thing to obstruct the 
vision — there is neither Koot nor Branch there." 
Dow had one great requisite for a preacher ; he 
feared no man. With unflinching resolution he 



150 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

presented liimself every where, and if perchance 
signs of a rude commotion among his auditors 
manifested themselves, he met them like Whit- 
field, and exclaimed — These bitter herbs make good 
sauce and promote digestion. He might then be 
listened to with breathless attention. All annoy- 
ances he reckoned as the workings of Providence 
in his behalf, and preserving a sort of armed neu- 
trality, kept aloof from personal interference, con- 
forming to the advice of Eoger Vose, " Let every 
man skin his own skunk." 

There were but two houses of public wor- 
ship of the Methodist Society when I first heard 
him, the first erected in John street, with 
old Peter Williams, the tobacconist, as sexton. 
The old negro was then striving to sustain a 
rival opposition in the tobacco line, with the 
famous house of the Lorillards. The other meet- 
ing-house was in Second, now Forsyth street. In 
this latter I have listened to Dow from the pulpit, 
with his wife Peggy near him, a functionary of 
equally attractive personal charms. A reciprocal 
union of heads and hearts seemed to bind them 
together. In short, he was far more fortunate in 
the choice of his spouse than his great forerunner 
John Wesley. We are not to forget that Moors- 
field was mad with threats of damnation when 
Lorenzo Dow commenced as an itinerant spiritual 
instructor with us. Lorenzo rarely, I believe, for- 



METHODISM. 151 

sook, even for expediency's sake, tlie line of his 
vocation. Blending, as often was the case in those 
days, with the itinerant priesthood, the ofl&ces of 
the physician and the preacher, he might have 
sometimes administered a bolus for relief ; but 
I am unaware that he adopted the " Primitive 
Physic " of his Great Master, and dealt out crude 
quicksilver by ounces to alleviate physical ills. 

But let me ask who now shall estimate the 
advance of that vast denomination of Christians 
from that period, with the solitary and starvehng 
magazine of William Phoebus as the exponent of 
its doctrines, up to its present commanding condi- 
tion, with the venerable names of Hedding, Fisk, 
Durbin, Olin, Simpson and Stevens, among its re- 
corded apostles, with its rich and affluent period- 
ical literature, its well-endowed schools and col- 
leges, its myriad of churches, its soul-sustaining 
melodious bymns, its astounding Book Concern, 
with its historian Bangs, and its erudite M'Clin- 
tock among its great theological professors and 
authors. 

If my memory fails me not, in the month of 
May, 1819, arrived in this city William Ellery 
Channing, with a coadjutor, both distinguished 
preachers of the Unitarian persuasion, of Boston. 
They were solicitous to procure a suitable place of 
worship. They made application at churches of 
different denominations of religious belief, to be 



152 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

accommodated at the intermediate hours between 
the morning and afternoon service, but in vain. 
They next urged their request at several of the 
pubHc charities where convenient apartments 
might be found, but with the same result. Like 
the two saints in Baucis and Philemon — 

" Tried every tone might pity win, 
But not a soul would let them in." 

Still not wholly disheartened, a communication 
was received from them, through a committee, ad- 
dressed to the trustees of the College of Phy- 
sicians and Surgeons, then in Barclay street. The 
Board was forthwith summoned, and the sj)ecial 
business of the meeting fully discussed, but with 
some warmth of feeling. This communication 
read as follows : — 

^'May 11, 1819. 
" To David Hosack, M. D. 

" Sir : — It may be known to you that there are individuals in 
this city who have been accustomed to receive religious instruc- 
tion from pastors who are not associated with the regular clergy 
of this place. Some of those gentlemen would be gratified to 
have it in their power to improve the opportunities for a con- 
tinuance of this instruction, which are occasionally afforded by 
the temporary visits of the clergy of their acquaintance to this 
city. 

" The subscribers would, on this occasion, particularly men- 
tion that the Rev. William E. Channing, of Boston, is expected to 
pass the next Sunday with his friends in New York. 

"Emboldened by a consciousness of the liberality which dis- 
tinguishes your enlightened profession, they take the liberty to 



UNITAKIANISM. 153 

desire you to lay before the Board of the Medical College their 
request, that the lecture-room of that institution may be used for 
the purposes abore alluded to. They would confine their request 
for the present, to the use of the room on the next Sunday, but 
would venture to suggest that there may probably be future occa- 
sions when a repetition of the favor now asked, would be grate- 
fully received, and in such case they would be happy to comply 
with any terms as to compensation which the College may deem 
proper. 

We are, Sir, with great respect, 

Your obedient servants, 

I. G. Pearson, 
H. D. Sedgwick, 

H, D. Sewall. 
New York, May 10, 1819. 

"Proceedings op the College. 

"Letter from I. G. Pearson, H. D. Sedgwick, and Henry D 
Sewall, was read : 

" Resolved, That this College grant permission to the Rev. W. 
E. Channing, of Boston, to perform divine service in the Hall of 
this University on the ensuing Sunday, as requested in the above 
communication. 

" The Registrar of the College, John W. Francis, was author- 
ized to furnish a copy of said resolution to said committee, duly 
signed by the President of the Board and the Registrar." 

On the following Sabbath, Dr. Channing en- 
tered the professional desk of the larger lecture- 
room, and delivered, in his mellowed accents, a dis- 
course to a crowded audience, among whom were 
his associate brother preacher, and several pro- 
fessors of the college. But two or three days had 
transpired, from the occurrence of this first preach- 



154 HISTORICAL DISCOUBSE. 

ing of TJnitarianism, before it was loudly spoken 
of, and in terms of disapprobation not the mildest. 
The censure on such a pernicious toleration came 
strongest from the Presbyterian order of clergy. 
I heard but one prominent Episcopalian condemn 
the whole affair, but that condemnation was in 
emphatic phraseology. There doubtless were 
others. Inquiries were made what individuals 
had constituted the meeting ; and as a majority 
happened to be the professors of the college, they 
were particularly destined to receive the hardest 
blows. Some three days after that memorable 
Sunday, I accidentally met the great theological 
thunderbolt of the times, Dr. John M. Mason, in 
the bookstore of that intelligent publisher and 
learned bibliopole, James Eastburn. Mason soon 
approached me, and in earnestness exclaimed, 
" You doctors have been engaged in a wrongful 
work ; you have permitted heresy to come in 
among us, and have countenanced its approach. 
You have furnished accommodations for the devil's 
disciples." Not wholly unhinged, I replied, " We 
saw no such great evil in an act of religious toler- 
ation ; nor do I think," I added, ^^that one indi- 
vidual member is responsible for the acts of an 
entire corporation." " You are all equally guilty," 
cried the doctor, with enkindled warmth. " Do 
you know what you have done ? You have ad- 
vanced infidelity by complying with the request 



UNITAKIANISM. 155 

of these skeptics." " Sir," said I, " we hardly 
felt disposed to sift their articles of belief as a re- 
ligious society." ^* There, sir, there is the diffi- 
culty," exclaimed the doctor. " Belief : they 
have no belief — they believe in nothing, having 
nothing to believe. They are a paradox ; you 
cannot fathom them : how can you fathom a 
thing that has no bottom ? " I left the doctor 
dreadfully indignant, uttering something of the 
old slur on the skeptical tendencies of the faculty 
of physic. Such was the beginning of Unitarian 
public worship in this city. 

If there be present any of that religious asso- 
ciation within the sound of my voice, I throw 
myself upon their clemency, that they be not 
offended by my ecclesiastical facts. I aim at a ve- 
racious historical narrative of times long elapsed, 
and I feel that my personal knowledge of many 
members of that religious persuasion will secure 
me from inimical animadversion by so enlightened 
and charitable a denomination. Unitarianism had 
indeed its advocates among us long before the pil- 
grimage of Channing in 1819. Everybody at all * 
versed in the progress of religious creeds in this 
country will, I believe, assign to Dr. James Free- 
man the distinction of having been the first Uni- 
tarian minister of the first Unitarian church in 
New England. He promulgated his faith from 
the pulpit of King's Chapel in Boston, which 



156 HISTORICAL DreCOURSE. 

cliurch, however, had beeD vacant for some time, 
owing to political circumstances growing out of 
the American Kevolution. He thus became the 
means of converting the first Episcopal church of 
the New England States into the first Unitarian 
church. , Having been refused ordination by 
Bishop Seabuiy, of Connecticut, Freeman received 
a lay ordination by his society alone, as their rec- 
tor and minister, in 1787. I know nothing of him 
personally ; but the old and the young teU us he 
was of spotless integrity, of a sweet demeanor, and 
heavenly minded. He was an active promoter of 
the Massachusetts Historical Society ; he was a 
correspondent of Lindley and of Belsham. The 
distinguished Channing, who had been a rigid 
Calvinist, was converted by Freeman into a Uni- 
tarian. John Kirkland, so long the admired Presi- 
dent of Harvard University, impressed with like 
theological doctrines, was sedulous in his calling, 
and earnest in making known the " Light of Na- 
ture,'' a work of curious metaphysical research 
from the acute mind of Abraham Tucker, pub- 
lished under the assumed name of Edward Search. 
That our Boston friends had favored us with 
disciples of that faith in this city before that time 
is most certain, else a society of that order of be- 
lievers could not have been so rapidly formed as 
appears by their organization in Chambers street 
in 1821, when the Eev. Edward Everett delivered 



UNITAEIANISM. 157 

the dedication sermon, with suitable exercises by 
the Kev. Henry Ware, jun. ; again, at the instal- 
lation of their new building, corner of Prince and 
Mercer streets, in 1826, when Dr. Channing 
preached the dedication sermon, and the Kev. Dr. 
Walker offered the final prayer. Still further, we 
find the Church of the Messiah, in Broadway, con- 
secrated and the installation sermon delivered by 
Dr. Walker, and the pastoral duties assigned to 
Dr. Dewey ; but, for some years past, these have 
been discharged by Dr. Osgood. And again, we 
find the organization of the Church of the Divine 
Unity completed in 1845, the pastoral duties de- 
volving on Dr. Bellows ; and again, the last-named 
church being disposed of to the Universalist So- 
ciety, we witness the magnificent edifice for Uni- 
tarian worship, called All Souls' Church, situated 
on the Fourth Avenue, consecrated December 25, 
1855, the Kev. Dr. Bellows, pastor.* 

The writings of Linsley, of Priestley, of Bel- 
sham, of Wakefield, were not wholly unfamiliar 

* The Rev. Dr. Osgood, in his Historical Discourse, entitled 
" Twenty-five Years of a Congregation," thus expresses himself, 
when speaking of the origin and progress of the Unitarian wor- 
ship in this city : — " Dr. Channing preached to a large audience 
in the Hall of the Medical College, Barclay street, which was 
granted by the Trustees, notwithstanding violent opposition from 
some of the professors of the institution. Thus, to the medical 
profession, belongs the honor of giving our form of Liberal Chris- 
tianity the first public hearing in New York." 



158 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

works in this city ; nor could those early fathers, 
so often ransacked in the polemical disquisitions on 
the church of the first three centuries, have heen 
altogether overlooked by our scholars and divines. 
This inference I deduce from the indignation which 
so generally sprung up among the patrons of the 
work when the American edition of Eees' Cyclo- 
paedia was commenced by Samuel F. Bradford. 
This enterprising publisher had in his prospectus 
announced that that great undertaking would be 
revised, corrected, enlarged, and adapted to this 
country. It was soon seen that, among other ar- 
ticles, that of accommodation in theology, which 
the learned Eees affirmed was a method that 
served as a way for solving some of the greatest 
difficulties relating to the prophecies, had been 
maltreated by an American reviser, reputed to be 
Dr. Ashbel Green, in Bradford's reprint. This 
unwarrantable act created uneasiness here, as well 
as among our Eastern brethren, and had nearly 
jeopardized the patriotic intentions of the noble- 
hearted Philadelphian, Bradford, whose purpose 
was to enrich the literature and philosophy of our 
Kepublic with that monumental work. The dis- 
satisfaction at this literary fraud pervaded so many 
patrons here and elsewhere that I, even at that 
early date, came to the conclusion that Unitarian- 
ism could scarcely be classed among the novelties 
of the day, and was not limited to any one section 



UNITARIANISM. 159 

of the country. The perverted article doubtless 
partook originally of the religious faith of the 
London editor. Never did the old Anthology Club 
present a nobler independence on the rights of 
opinion and of literary property than in their criti- 
cism on the affected emendation of the American 
copy of Rees. It is but justice to state of this 
great work, which still so justly holds a place in 
our libraries, that these disgraceful mutilations of 
Rees ceased, after the reprint of the first volume 
of the Cyclopasdia, and the honest Bradford had 
weighty reasons to congratulate himself on the 
seasonable reproofs administered against the unjust 
editors by the Tudors, and Kirklands, and Buck- 
minsters of ^' The Literary Emporium." 

While in London I was a frequent visitor of 
Dr. Rees. A more captivating example of the 
Christian charities enshrined in one mortal, the 
eye could not light on. He possessed a tall and 
athletic frame, and a countenance of great benig- 
nity. He had all the requisites of a powerful 
preacher, in person, in manner, in tone, and in 
diction. His urbanity and his placidity of dispo- 
sition secured the esteem of all who approached 
him. He told me that his labors were then nearly 
brought to a close ; that for more than thirty 
years he had been confined to his study, an ordi- 
nary room ; that his diurnal labor was of many 
hours ; that, save his Sabbath preaching at the 



160 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Old Jewry, his only exercise had been his limited 
walk daily to his publishers, the Longmans. His 
fair and lively skin, his bright eye and his whole- 
some appearance, with such a life of mental devo- 
tion and such confinement, put at nought all my 
theoretical doctrines on the laws of health. He 
must have been more than a teetotaller. I was 
informed he was the last of the Doddridge wig 
order, an imposing article, but which yielded in 
dimensions and artistic elaboration to the more 
formidable one which invested the brain-case of 
the great Hellenist, Dr. Samuel Parr, with its dis- 
tensive and seemingly patulous gyrations. To 
the curious in habiliments, I may add, that the 
wig of that right worthy, lately with us, Dr. Liv- 
ingston, was of the Doddridge order, that of old 
Dr. Rodgers, Samuel Parr's. Nor is it trifling to 
state the fact, for there was a time, according to 
Southey, when the wig was considered as necessa- 
ry for a learned head, as an ivy bush for an owl. 
You will pardon this digression on Rees' Cyclopae- 
dia, inasmuch as it elucidates the point I would 
sustain, were this a fit occasion, that in the origin 
and spread of the Unitarian creed in this country, 
we are hardly justified to limit our attention to 
the movements of our Boston or Eastern friends. 
The well-known letter of Franklin to Stiles sup- 
ports this view, and we have seen that when occa- 
sion has prompted, its advocates rise up limited to 



EPISCOPALIANISM. 161 

no special locality. The community that can 
enumerate among its supporters such writers and 
scholars as Channing, Dewey, Osgood, Furness, and 
Bellows, need cherish no apprehension that their 
cause will fall through from a stultified indiffer- 
ence. But I find myself launching in deep waters, 
and will near the shore. 

Enough and more than enough has been said 
of the workings of the principles of religious tol- 
eration among us ; they furnish instructive proofs 
of the freedom secured to the people by our admi- 
rable constitutional form of .government ; the in- 
tellect knows it, the searcher after truth is sus- 
tained by it. 

With a very brief notice of the Episcopalian 
denomination, I shall terminate these hasty sketch- 
es of rehgious matters. The Episcopalians of this 
metropolis have exercised a great influence on the 
interests of learning among New Yorkers, and on 
their institutions of pubhc instruction and hu- 
manity. They have also proved warm friends to 
the New York Historical Society. 

The disruption of the colonies from the Mother 
Country proved more disastrous in its immediate 
effects to the Protestant Episcopal Church than 
to that perhaps of any other religious association. 
The ties which bound her to the forms and cere- 
monials of "the Church of England, were strong 
and numerous ; her ministers, with few excep- 



162 HISTOEICAL DISCOURSE. 

tions, favored the cause of the loyalists, and con- 
sequently in a large majority of instances were, 
upon the restoration of peace, compelled to aban- 
don their pastoral charges, and seek a livelihood 
elsewhere. This consequence, with the disasters 
of the times, resulted in a deserted ministry, and 
in a disabled and poverty-stricken religious com- 
munity. The conscientious Churchman, bewail- 
ing the state of affairs, and anxious for the future, 
looked forward with fluctuating hopes to the pe- 
riod when a happy issue might be found in the 
various deliberations which now occupied the 
minds of the friends of the Episcopate, not unlike 
those which agitated the patriots of the Kevolu- 
tion amidst their discussions on the adoption of 
the Articles of Confederation by the old Congress. 
At length a convention was held in Philadelphia, 
which continued from the 27th of September to 
the 7th of October, 1785, and delegates appeared 
from New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Dela- 
ware, Maryland, Virginia, and South Carohna. 
Its labors brought forth the Protestant E]3iscopal 
Book of Common Prayer, proposed for the Protes- 
tant Episcopal Church, printed by Hall and Sel- 
lers, in 1786. This book, now rarely to be found, 
received the name of the Proposed Book. It was 
reprinted at London in 1789 ; it contained no 
Nicene Creed, or Athanasian Creed ; it had the 
Apostles' Creed, but omitted " he descended into 



BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER. 163 

hell." It had a special prayer for the then exist- 
ing government. It had a special supplication in 
the liturgy for the then Congress, and a form of 
service or prayer for the 4th of July. 

The Convention was again held in Philadel- 
phia, in September, 1789, William White, Presi- 
dent, for the purpose of settling Articles of 
Union, discipline, uniformity of worship, and gen- 
eral government among all the churches in the 
United States. The Prayer Book was now so 
adjusted as to meet with great acceptance and 
with full approval. At the instance of the Eng- 
lish bishops, the passage " he descended into hell," 
was restored, with a proviso, that the words " he 
went into the place of departed spirits," might or 
might not be substituted. The Nicene Creed was 
restored; the prayers were made to conform to the 
now established government, for the President and 
all in civil authority. This Convention agreed to 
abolish the service for the 4th of July, but allowed 
each bishop the power of providing a suitable ser- 
vice for that and all other political occasions. In 

1792, Bishop Provoost, who had been absent from 
indisposition at the former Convention, presided. 
The Church ordinal, for the ordination of deacons 
and priests, and the consecration of bishops, was 
agreed upon. It was printed by Hugh Gaine, in 

1793. The articles of religion were agreed to 
in Convention in 1801, and have since that 



164 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

time been published with the Book of Common 
Prayer."-'' 

This brief notice of the history of the Book of 
Common Prayer, according to the use of the 
Protesta.nt Episcopal Church in the United States 
of America, seemed necessary, inasmuch as that 

* The venerable Society for the propagation of the Gospel in 
foreign parts, at a very early date of their organization adopted 
means for the circulation of the Liturgy among our Indian tribes. 
The Society was incorporated in 1701, and the very next year 
they sent missionaries to the Mohawks, who were situated near 
the English settlements. Measures were adopted for a translation 
of the Liturgy, and this first translation was first printed in New 
York about the year 1724, under the direction of the Rev. Mr. 
Andrews, the Society's missionary to the Mohawks. This edition 
comprised the Morning and Evening Service, the Litany and 
Catechism, to which were added select passages from the Old and 
New Testament, and some family prayers. The communion office, 
.that of baptism, matrimony, and burial of the dead, with more 
passages of Scripture, occasional prayers, and some singing 
psalms, were translated by the Rev. Dr. Henry Barclay, who had 
served the Indian mission with great fidelity for many years ; and 
these additions of Barclay were inserted in the next edition of 
the Indian Prayer Book also printed in New York in 1769, under 
the inspection of the Rev. Dr. John Ogilvie, who succeeded Dr. 
Barclay in that mission. Barclay and Ogilvie are among the ven- 
erable divines associated with Trinity Church. 

It is understood that during the course of the American 
Revolutionary war most of the Indian prayer books were de- 
stroyed, and the Mohawks urged the necessity of a new supply, 
when by solicitation on their part the Governor of Canada, Halde- 
mand, ordered it to be reprinted at Quebec in 1780. In 1787, 
the venerable Society above mentioned again caused a repub- 
lication of the work in large octavo, with engravings, for the Mo- 
hawks, which was printed in London in that year. To this edition 



BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER. 165 

highly prized volume is the recognized standard of 
the Episcopal Church of this country. It has 
proved of inestimable importance to the progress 
of the Church, as the bond of union of that im- 
portant religious community ; it has preserved in- 
tact her forms and ceremonials, and her devo- 
tions ; it has saved her fi-om division and dis- 
union ; it has suppressed intestine broils ; it has 
promoted uniformity of worship, a most important 

was added the Gospel according to St. Mark, translated into the 
Mohawk language by the renowned Indian chief T^ Hayendanegea^ 
Capt. Joseph Brant^ whose life was not long since written by the 
late Col. Stone. This is said to be the first Gospel which had ap- 
peared entire in the language of that tribe of Indians. 

Certain portions of the Book of Common Prayer, according to 
the use of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States 
of America, translated into the Mohawk or Iroquois language, by 
the request of the Domestic Committee of the Board of Missions 
of the Protestant Episcopal Church, were published in Xew York, 
in small duodecimo, in 1853. This book contained also a selec- 
tion of the Psalms and Hymns, with the Indian translation. This 
work was accomplished by the Rev. Eleazer Williams, Y. D. M., 
the same individual who recently was conjectured by many to 
have been the lost prince (Louis XYII.) of the house of the 
Bourbons, and whose claims to that distinction were largely set 
forth in Putnam's Magazine, and in a distinct work by the late 
Rev, Mr. Hanson, I have known Mr. Williams for nearly half a 
century, during nearly all which time he has been devoted to the 
missionary cause : the last time I saw him was about three years 
ago, when he delivered to me a copy of his translation. I enter 
not in this place into a consideration of his Indian blood or of his 
royal origin. He looks, I will say, very like a Bourbon. Bishop 
Hobart took a deep interest in the man and in his missionary 
labors. 



166 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

object ; and by it she has avoided the distractions 
and the local strifes which have too often dis- 
turbed the harmony and fellowship of other Chris- 
tian associations. If from the cold lips and still 
colder hearts of the mere formalist, its reading 
has sometimes wanted the spirit of devotion, how 
much oftener has it saved from vulgar importuni- 
ties in prayer, and rescued the finer emotions of 
the soul from irreverent demands of Heaven, and 
noxious crudities. It turns with conscious recti- 
tude from the incoherent ravings of enthusiasm, 
and disdains to look on the elongated visage of a 
scaramouch. The north and the south, the east 
and the west, hold it in equal reverence, and do 
homage to its unparalleled beauty of diction and 
its devotional sentiment. Living or dying, it 
yields the bread of life. 

New York had her share in that goodly work ; 
her learned Provoost was a member of both Con- 
ventions that framed it, and the first consecration 
in the Church of an additional bishop, was the act 
of Episcopacy by Provoost, in this city, in the lay- 
ing on of hands on Thomas John Claggett, D. D., 
of Maryland, in September, 1792 ; at which cere- 
monial White of Pennsylvania, Madison of Vir- 
ginia, and Seabury of Connecticut, assisted. — 
Provoost, White, and Madieon, were the regularly 
consecrated bishops of the English Episcopate, of 
the American Episcopal Church, the two former 



BISHOP SEABURY. 167 

having been elevated to the Episcopate by Moore, 
Archbishop of Canterbury, in the chapel of Lam- 
beth Palace, in 1787, and Madison in 1790, in 
the same place, by the same authority. Bishop 
Seabury had received consecration in 1784, at 
Aberdeen, Scotland, by three nonjuring bishops, 
and by this convenient action of the bishops of 
the English consecration, and of Bishop Seabury, 
the American Episcopal Church (as it is believed 
intentionally) united both Episcopates in theirs, 
thereby closing the door against the future occur- 
rence of questions which might prove dehcate and 
embarrassing. Seabury was a man of strong na- 
tive powers, of cultivated intellect, of extensive 
influence, ardent in the cause of Episcopacy. The 
Church may with sincerity ever hold him in grate^ 
ful remembrance. When her sorrows were gravest, 
he imparted consolation ; when her weakness was 
greatest, he yielded her strength. Her tribula- 
tions only added to his zealous efforts in her be- 
half. He adhered to the royal side in the great 
contest with the Mother Country, and dwelt among 
the refugees in New York. He united in the pro- 
test declaring abhorrence of all unlawful con- 
gresses and committees, and, doubtless with con- 
scientious \dews, under the patronage of -the 
obnoxious Tryon, delivered a discourse to fear God 
and honor the king. He died a pensioner of the 
British government, and, I incline to the opinion, 



168 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

was looked upon somewhat witli a jaundiced 
vision by those devoted patriots, Provoost and 
White. 

It has been more than once affirmed, and the de- 
claration is in print, that Bishop Provoost, as senior 
presbyter, and senior in the ministry, was consecrated 
first, and Bishop White next, though in the same 
day and hour, February 4, 1787. The son-in-law of 
Provoost, C. D. Golden, a man of veracity, assured 
me such was the case. If so, Provoost is to be 
recorded as the Father of the American Episco- 
pate. It is painful to pluck a hair from the ven- 
erable head of the apostolic White, but we are 
dealing with history. White, who died at the ad- 
vanced age of eighty-nine years, lived to see the 
American Church with some twenty-three bish- 
ops, he having officiated at nearly every consecra- 
tion. What vast obligations are due to his hal- 
lowed memory by the American Episcopate for the 
wise counsels, the many and inestimable services 
of that divine character ! 

Dissent, however lowly. Episcopacy, howevei 
high, will coalesce in opinion of the varied knowl- 
edge and classical attainments of Provoost, the 
piety and beneficence of Moore, and the talents, 
zeal, and ceaseless activity of Hobart. These 
eminent dignitaries of the Church may, for their 
several qualities, be ranked among the most con- 
spicuous of their order, who have flourished in 



BISHOP HOBART. 169 

New York ; and were it practicable, we would 
fain dwell in particular upon the earnestness and 
achievements of the last-named. His death is too 
recent to require much at our hands ; sorrow at 
his early departure was universal ; it was felt as 
an irreparable loss to the interests of a great com- 
munitVj who had almost by his individual efforts 
been extricated from many difficulties, and risen 
to a commanding importance in numbers and in- 
fluence. The aptitude of Hobart, in the work of 
the ministry, and his astonishing executive talent, 
have scarcely a parallel : his vigilance noticed 
every thing that tended either to retard the ad- 
vancement or quicken the progress of the Episco- 
pal Church. He was desirous of a learned priest- 
hood, and much of his time and his intellect were 
given to the maintenance of the General Theo- 
logical Seminary ; he was ardent for the practical, 
and sought befitting laborers, as the harvest was 
truly great. Many of the Episcopate had a richer 
fund of classical erudition ; but not one could be 
pointed out who possessed an industry and devo- 
tion superior to his. It may be questioned wheth- 
er he lost an idle hour during his whole career as 
bishop for nearly twenty years. He exercised a 
weighty influence on public sentiment, and the 
purity of his life stamped his opinions with a cor- 
responding value. The Church to him was all in 
all. His adhesion to what he deemed its ortho- 
8 



170 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

doxy, allowed of no deviation from its prescrip- 
tions, nor could he cherish reconciliation with the 
doubting and the latitudinarian. His frankness 
enabled his opponents always to know where to 
find him ; from his decision of character, he could 
hardly be expected to live in perfect charity with 
all men. He was more than once absorbed in 
controversies on ecclesiastical polity, and his sen- 
timents rendered him obnoxious to a portion of 
his diocese. The harshest opinion I ever heard 
him utter was, that Heber was only a ballad 
writer. The sentiment must have taken posses- 
sion of his bosom from the circumstance that the 
Bishop of Calcutta gave countenance to the Brit- 
ish Bible Society ; and not a few of Bishop Ho- 
bart's friends regretted the pertinacity with which 
he opposed the organization of a like institution 
here. Like Herbert Marsh, he dreaded the conse- 
quences of distributing the Scriptures without the 
Book of Common Prayer. The lamented Milner, 
whom the Church still mourns, did not wholly 
escape the penalty of resistance to the views of 
the American prelate, and that eminent statesman 
and patriot, Kufus King, after having been chosen 
a Vice President of that National Society, re- 
signed his office and withdrew from his high sta- 
tion at the special solicitation of his personal 
friend. Bishop Hobart. In his conversation, the 
Bishop was animated, abounding in anecdotes and 



BISHOP HOBART. I7l 

general knowledge, and was particularly attrac- 
' tive. His temper was sprightly ; he avowed his 
opinions with great freedom. He had strong feel- 
ings in behalf of American institutions, and w^as 
averse to the union of Church and State affairs. 
The sincerity of his Christian belief was edifying- 
ly demonstrated in the manner of his death. He 
sickened of bilious disease while on his diocesan 
visitation, at Auburn ; on the morning of his final 
departure, the early sun shone in upon his cham- 
ber ; "it is the last time," said he, '^ that I shall 
witness the rising sun ; I shall soon behold the 
Sun of righteousness." Thus died a great and 
good man. He who would know more of this 
eminent pillar of the Church, will consult the 
Life, written by the venerable rector of Trinity, 
Dr. Berrian, the Records published by Professor 
M'Vickar, and the Memorial by the Eev. Dr. 
Schroeder. 

Before I conclude this portion of my subject, 
I must be permitted to say a few words on the 
literature of the Church ; and I am happy to add, 
that New York has not been behindhand with her 
sister States in her contributions towards that 
great object. I have already adverted to the low 
and precarious condition of Episcopacy at and 
about the time when the Constitution of the 
American government was brought into practical 
action, and the many difficulties which encom- 



172 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

passed the Churcli in the scattered and limited 
number of her ministry. The noble and venerable 
Society for propagating the Gospel in foreign parts, 
had indeed sown precious seeds in divers places 
over the land. But the Church was prostrate, in- 
volved in fiscal troubles, and wanting in those 
effective measures of enlightenment indispensably 
requisite to rear up her intellectual greatness. 
Every intelligent individual is ready to acknowl- 
edge, with cheerful feelings, that we owe to our 
brethren of other denominations a large debt for 
the many able and instructive works with which 
they have enriched the theological hterature of the 
nation. We are aware of the scholarship of An- 
dover, the biblical expositions of Princeton, and 
the graces of classical composition which have 
proceeded from old Harvard and Yale. In days 
past we remember Edwards, and Emerson, and 
Stiles, and Dwight. We forget not Hodge, Kob- 
inson, Park, Norton, Stewart, Mason, and a host 
of others ; and we believe there is substantial rea- 
son for the high estimation in which the works of 
many American divines are held, arising from the 
intrinsic excellence of their respective authorship ; 
and if report deceive us not, we have the assurance 
that among the most successful reprints abroad, 
are what we shall please to call American the- 
ology. 

As respects the literature of the Episcopal 



CHURCH LITERATURE. 173 

Church, it seems to be most noteworthy for its con- 
servative element. It is preceded by the Prayer 
Book, or is in close fraternity with it, and this 
book of sacred wisdom gives a complexion to the 
thoughts and workings of the ministry of the 
Church that stamps a peculiarity more or less 
legible on its intellectual progeny. Like the pen- 
dulum in clockwork, it controls its movements, 
guards against irregularity, and secures harmony 
in all its parts. We thence see that its elab- 
orations are characterized less by diversity of 
speculation and startling novelties, and are to be 
noticed more for exegetical exposition and the elu- 
cidation of scriptural truth. Both by the pulpit 
and by the pen it is disposed more to persuade 
than to threaten, more to lead than to drive ; and 
finds it more consonant to its own emotions to an- 
nounce the glad tidings from lips of praise, than 
in wrathful accents proclaim a Redeemer's love. 
Such it may be affirmed is the policy of the Church, 
and such is the attribute of her literature. Prin- 
ciples such as are now indicated, pervade all her 
writings, and if so be an anathema is sometimes 
found, it is to be considered as an exception to her 
whole policy. The divinity which holds possession 
in her breast, is the redeeming power of gospel 
truth. "What triumphs she has secured by such 
procedure will be best learned by comparing her 
vast increase and united strength at this present 



174 HISTORICAL DISCOUESE. 

time with lier feeble condition and disjointed state 
at her first organization. Let her in conscious 
purity and in the plenitude of divine grace cherish 
the most confident hopes. Let her go on her way- 
rejoicing. Let her be ever jealous of her high 
title, the Protestant Episcopal Church. Ever let 
the noble army of reformers command her admi- 
ration and her loudest plaudits. If the ignorant 
comprehend not her simplicity, and the cynical 
complain that her covenant has been invaded in 
these latter days by effete devices, let them be told 
all is as a passing cloud, ]3regnant with untold 
riches, and that her brightness, thanks to a good 
Providence, is hourly becoming more clear and 
beautiful, and her foundation stronger and strong- 
er on the Kock of Ages. Let schismatics know 
that exploded theories find no aliment within her 
bosom, that obsolete formularies are at war with 
her doctrines and her discipline. She repudiates 
a pantomimic worship. Her formulary is the con- 
formity of the heart to the plain and simple and 
comprehensible doctrines of apostolic communi- 
cation. Let her feel that she has arrived to that 
vigor by inherent strength, that in confidence she 
may trust in her manhood and go forth triumph- 
ant. What has served her so well for more than 
half a century, will suffice much longer. Her 
hardest trials have passed, and she is neither de- 
bilitated nor impure. The sound need no crutch. 



CHURCH LITERATURE. l75 

All that she now asks is, to live in harmony with 
the professing Christians of every sect and denom- 
ination. She is ready, she is willing, she trusts 
she is able, to do the work of her Master ; and 
whether under the humble roof of the village 
chapel, or within the dome of the mighty cathe- 
dral, she has learned by experience that her coin 
will pass current without amalgamation. 

A word or two more on the literature of the 
Church. If the army of New England divines has 
almost overwhelmed the land with their achieve- 
ments in the field of literature and theology, there 
is still room enough left for us to point out a few 
landmarks secured by the professors of the Episco- 
pal Church. She has scattered abroad in profusion 
single discourses of elevated thought, strong devo- 
tional sentiments, and sound practical edification. 
True she lacks earnestness in historical detail, and 
seems too listless of the character and services of 
her predecessors. She ought, in an especial man- 
ner, no longer to overlook the vast importance of 
her history, faithfully written, for the honor of her 
devoted sons, and for the study and improvement 
of her future disciples ; at this present time, too, 
when the materials are still accessible, it behooves 
her to gather together the incidents of her career 
amid untold trials, and ofier them, in a becoming 
form, as a demonstration of her devotion and wis- 
dom in her high commission. It is gratifying to 



176 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

see tliat within a few years past the subject has, 
among all her calls of duty, awakened desires in 
some of the most efficient of her people to remove 
the obloquy which has too long rested on her, and 
several able writers have recently come to the 
rescue. The " Memoirs of the Protestant Epis- 
copal Church," pubhshed years ago by the vener- 
able White, have been followed by those of the 
Church of South Carolina, by Dr. Dalcho ; by the 
Contributions of Dr. Hawks, in illustration of the 
Churches of Virginia and of Maryland ; by the 
History of Trinity Church, New York, by Dr. 
Berrian ; by the Continuity of the Church of 
England, by Dr. Seabury ; by the History of Dr. 
Dorr ; by two volumes of a newly formed associa- 
tion, the Protestant Episcopal Historical Society, 
having its origin, I believe, in this city ; and, very 
lately, by a work of curious incidents, the History 
of St. John's Church, Elizabethtown, New Jersey. 
Some years since we had also historical materials 
of ecclesiastical value, in the Centennial Discourse 
concerning the Church at Quincy, by Dr. Cutler. 
All this augurs well. Bishop Mead's Keminis- 
cences are materials of instructive import ; and 
the Keminiscences of Bishop Chase will long hold 
in esteem the character and the arduous labors of 
the Pioneer Bishop of the West. That hardy and 
indomitable man has left the workings of a strong 
spirit in behalf of a mighty cause. He was the 



BISHOP CHASE. 177 

architect of his own renown ; he had little book 
learning, but much knowledge of men. Having 
early laid plans for his professional life, no obsta- 
cles intimidated him ; and his determination, the 
result of his own cogitations, never forsook him. 
His settled purpose was for others, not for himself ; 
he could therefore present a bolder front in his 
pressing demands for the accomplishment of his 
great designs. His track through almost unknown 
wilds will be studied hereafter with a more appre- 
ciating judgment, and the blessings he has be- 
stowed on the Church find a record from the pen 
that records national benefits, deduced from his 
fruitful doings. Many of his journeyings were 
through a portion of that country, then so little 
understood, which the brave Carver had travelled ; 
and one may also place in juxtaposition these two 
intrepid men, Jonathan and Philander ; the sic 
vos noil vohis being equally the temporal reward 
of both. 

As associated with the Church's History, are the 
Memoirs of her eminent men ; and we are not to 
complain either of lack of numbers or of value in 
those already published. The biography of Sam- 
uel Johnson, the first President of Columbia Col- 
lege, by Chandler, is the most engaging of this de- 
partment of literary labor ; and we cannot regret 
too much that so few of the great mass of papers 
from which this volume was made up have found 



178 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

a place in this admirable work. The Memoirs of 
White are next in order of time, and are indis- 
pensable to the ecclesiastical historian ; while 
those of Hobart, Griswold, Moore, Kavenscroft, 
Bedell, and Wharton, unfold characteristics val- 
uable in elucidation of Church matters. It is not, 
however, to be concealed, that, like many religious 
biogra23hies, whether by authors abroad or at home, 
they often lack interest from the absence of per- 
sonal detail, and of that enhvening spirit which 
gives to- biography its most engaging attraction. 
It would have gladdened the hearts of thousands 
of every denomination of Christian behef, had 
Professor Wilson swelled to a threefold extent the 
Memoirs of the exalted White, feeling as they do 
that no subject of the Church in its primary days 
was encompassed round about with such precious 
material concerning its struggles, blended with the 
devotional services of its early promoters. Amid 
difiiculties innumerable we constantly meet the 
wise counsellor, the hallowed White. 

Honorable mention deserves to be made of the 
learned labor of Dr. Samuel Farmer Jarvis. This 
ripe scholar had been professor of biblical history 
in the recently organized General Theological Semi- 
nary of the Protestant Episcoj)al Church, and was 
subsequently made Historiographer of the Church 
at large by the General Convention. In his Eccle- 
siastical Chronology and History he evinced the 



SAMUEL H. TURNER. 179 

greatest research and devotion. Like notice is 
due to the various writings of Bishop Hopkins of 
Vermont ; and it is gratifying to see the reception 
his last work has met with by the reading pub- 
lic, — I mean his American Citizen. The devoted 
Episcopalian might often look with satisfaction 
into the writings of Bishops Hobart, Brownell, 
Potter, Whittingham, Eastburn, Burgess, M'll- 
vaine, Onderdonk, and Doane, and find proofs of 
scholastic lore in the pages of Verplanck, Wins- 
low, Coit, Griffin and Spencer. 

The canons of the Church.have been elucidated 
by Judge Murray Hoffman of the New York bar, 
and by the Eev. Dr. Hawks. The Constitution 
and Canons, by the latter, was a pecuHarly appro- 
priate subject for her ecclesiastical historian, and 
the competent have given their testimony in behalf 
of the excellence of the undertaking. I shall con- 
clude these very brief and imperfect sketches of 
the literary labors of the Church with a name 
widely known and appreciated by the erudite of 
both hemispheres, Samuel H. Turner. Dr. Tur- 
ner's reputation for varied and profound scholar- 
ship, for rabbinical knowledge, and the activity of 
his pen in critical expositions of sacred writ, have 
secured him permanent renown. I am forbidden 
an enumeration of his many works. The Theo- 
logical Seminary, in which he has labored so long, 
may congratulate herself on the honors with which 



180 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

such a professor enriclies her, and freely add his 
name to the select list of her ablest associates. 
Proofs sufficient, I think, have already been ad- 
vanced to show that the literature of the Church 
is not locked up in sealed libraries, but is an active 
power ; and from her present advanced and im- 
proved state, we may draw an equally safe infer- 
ence that her religion lies not dormant in the 
heart, but is an absolute principle, industrious in 
the work of faith. 

I leave ecclesiastical affairs, and propose saying 
a few words on a subject which the philosopher 
may pronounce of equal importance in a national 
point of view, — I allude to our system of public 
education. It has become a vast subject in this 
our day, and commands the admiration of remote 
nations. The faithful historian of our first settlers, 
Mr. Brodhead, in his minute research, has dwelt 
upon the theme with the genuine spirit of the phi- 
lanthropist, and clearly pointed out with what 
earnestness the sagacity of the Dutch penetrated 
into the wisdom of establishments for that pur- 
pose ; and so early as 1633, only twenty-four years 
after the arrival of Hudson, organized the first 
school in New Amsterdam. " Neither the perils 
of war," says Brodhead, " nor the busy pursuits 
of gain, nor the excitement of political strife, ever 
caused them to neglect the duty of educating 
their offspring." And with a love of the past, he 



PUBLIC SCHOOL EDUCATION. 181 

has recorded the name of this first schoolmaster. 



Adam Koelandsen ; and it well merits to be fur- 
ther stated, that Roelandsen's original establish- 
ment continues in a prosperous condition to this 
day, and is the parochial school of the Protestant 
Reformed Dutch Church, supported by voluntary 
contributions. I have some recollection of the 
first formation of that system in tliis city, which 
finally eventuated in the system of public schools. 
Only one year after your first measures were 
adopted to estabUsh the Historical Society did the 
duty of enlarging the domain of knowledge by 
public instruction take possession of our city 
rulers. The Trinity Church charity school, and 
other free schools under the governance of differ- 
ent religious associations, had indeed for years an 
existence, and were more or less prosperous ; but 
the great mass of children belonging to parents of 
no rehgious order was sadly neglected, save those 
who could accomplish the means of enlightenment 
at private institutions. The names of that noble 
band of citizens who were the applicants for an 
act to establish a free school in the city of New 
York for the education of such poor children as do 
not belong to, or are not provided for by any re- 
ligious society, are duly recorded in the reports of 
the Board of Education ; and he who looks over 
the list will recognize that inany of the names of 
our prominent residents, of exalted excellence, are 



182 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

found in the number. Under its restricted powers, 
the society organized its first school in May, 1806, 
with forty scholars. With enlarged charter powers, 
aided by the liberality of the city government, in 
1808 they were provided a spacious building, which 
admitted five hundred pupils. 

I remember well the discourse dehvered at the 
opening of this improved edifice, at the corner of 
Tryon Kow and Chatham street, by De Witt 
Chnton, the moving spirit of the whole affair. 
He was the president of the Society, and the 
Board of Education, in their Keport of 1854, say 
well when they annoimce that the address was 
worthy of the occasion, ^' as sowing the seed wheat 
of all harvests of education which subsequent 
years have gathered into our garners/' I have ac- 
companied Mr. Clinton in those earlier days, in his 
tour of inspection, with Thomas Eddy, Jacob 
Morton, Samuel Wood, Joseph Curtis, Kobert 
Bowne, Charles Wilkes, Cadwallader D. Colden, 
and others ; and I can testify to the scrutinizing 
devotion which Mr. Clinton gave to every thing 
that seemed calculated for the promotion of the 
great and novel design. By the death of Mr. 
Curtis veiy recently, all, I believe, of that philan- 
thropic corjDs are departed. I see none left of the 
original body of incorporators. 

It is impossible at this time to be more minute 
or dwell longer on this grateful subject. In every 



SYSTEM OF PUBLIC EDUCATION. 183 

condition of public trust to which Clinton was 
chosen through life, he never forgot education and 
the public schools. Every message of his, while 
governor, descants on the vast theme, and his sug- 
gestions, years ago, as head of the State, may, I 
think, be honestly stated to have led to that spe- 
cial department, the Normal Schools. He is the 
first individual I ever heard descant on their im- 
mense importance to the proper rearing of com- 
petent tutors, and on the provision which ought to 
be made for such an undertaking. I can scarcely 
conceive of a greater subject for a. public discourse 
than the origin, the progress, and present state of 
our system of PubKc Education ; in every condi- 
tion, from its humble beginning up to its com- 
manding importance at the present day, from the 
Free School Society of 1805 through the change 
to the Public School Society of 1826, providing 
for all classes of children ; next the Ward school 
organization of the then called District schools ; 
then to its present consolidation under the Board 
of Education of the City of New York, a period 
of nearly half a century. Well may that en- 
lightened citizen and public-spirited character, E. 
C. Benedict, in his Eeport of 1854, as president, 
say, " The services of those philanthropic laborers 
in the noblest of causes have imposed upon the city 
a debt of gratitude that can never be fitly esti- 
mated, much less repaid.'' During that period it 



184 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

has conferred the blessings of instruction on 600,000 
children, and on more than 12,000 teachers. So 
long as the influence of those children and their 
teachers shall he felt, (and when will it cease ?) so 
long, justly adds Mr. Benedict, " shall the useful- 
ness of the Pubhc School Society continue.'' I 
will add, that according to the last Report of the 
Board of Education from the present enlightened 
President, William H. Neilson, the whole number 
of schools within its jurisdiction during the year 
1855, was 271. The glory and imperishable ex- 
cellence of our public system of education, en- 
hanced by the influence of our self-government, 
by universal freedom and a free press, were demon- 
strated to be in accordance with enhghtened pub- 
lic intelligence, when at the election of 1850 the 
free school question was submitted to the popular 
suffrage. Free schools were sustained in this city 
by a vote of 39,075 to 1,011, a majority of nearly 
40 to 1. If more were wanting in confirmation, 
how easily could we swell the testimony by the re- 
corded opinions ill behalf of the vast and enduring 
benefits of knowledge among the masses by the 
testimony of our wisest statesmen and patriots. 
And let us ever keep before us the vital principle 
that the colossal proportions of the republic are 
endowed by education alone with a proportionate 
cohesive power. Where education moreover is 
popular, the creative faculty abounds ; and it is 



JOSEPH LANCASTER. 185 

cliaracteristic of such a state, that the people thus 
blessed daily achieve some new step in advance; 
whether it be in the modification of a rail or in 
new powers for the steam-engine. 

It would be omitting a duty and inflicting an 
act of injustice not to notice in the course of these 
remarks on education the well-remembered philan- 
thropist, Joseph Lancaster, whose arrival among 
us about the year 1820, created a sensation among 
the friends of useful knowledge. Lancaster, by 
many years service abroad, and by the discussion, 
which arose from his system of instruction, had 
rendered his name quite familiar at the time of his 
appearance in New York. It was conceded that 
he had effected a substantial advance in the means 
of enlightening the masses, and at a pecuniary 
expense well worth the action of the economical 
teacher. The patrons of the common schools, such 
men as Clinton, Griscom, Eddy and Wood, felt the 
duty obligatory to pay deference to the philosophi- 
cal stranger, and give countenance to his sugges- 
tions. But he had little to offer that was new ; the 
Lancasterian plan had been already widely tested ; 
it had its friends and its opponents. Lancaster laid 
claims to originality, and in part it was admitted 
that his merits were not to be overlooked. He had 
announced his innovation, for imparting elementary 
tuition, in 1803, but the controllers of the schools 
were ahve to what Bell had done, with the like 



186 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

intent, some years before ; hence lie lost the re- 
nown of priority of discovery, and his opportunity 
of essentially doing much to further his system 
was cut off; for with a patriotic vigilance the 
directors of these juvenile scholars were intent on 
further imj)rovements, w^hich were finally commend- 
ed for adoption under a new organization. Lan- 
caster finally announced that he had been walking 
in the steps of Dr. Bell, but that the notoriety 
and adoption of the new system were due to his 
energies ; but Bell had first conceived the idea of 
conducting a school through the medium of the 
scholars themselves. The very Quakerism of Lan- 
caster had tended vastly to promote the diffusion 
of his system, and the encouragement of his plans, 
and the sup23ort he received ought to have secured 
at least his temporal independence. But with in- 
creased fiscal means his expenditures had increased, 
and the philanthropic man, deserting the rigid 
and frugal habits of his sect, involved himself in 
many obligations, and now sought the chances of 
redemption by his transatlantic residence. There 
was, however, little to do by Lancaster or for him. 
Within a short time he became an object of elee- 
mosynary relief ; yet his Quaker disciples, with 
characteristic benevolence, were not behindhand in 
contributions. While, however, he could enumerate 
De Witt Clinton within his charity circle of 
friends, he felt protected. The latter years of his 



JOSEPH LANCASTER. 187 

life gave unmistakable evidences of hard times with 
him. I have rarely seen an object of deeper com- 
miseration among individuals who, according to 
the world's decision, had made a mark. He who 
had once figured in England, in his chariot and six, 
felt the want of means to purchase a crutch. An 
accident terminated his life, in IN^ew York, in 1839. 
I have indicated that Clinton was specially kind 
toward Lancaster : it was that sort of kindness that 
arose from a consideration of the good he had done, 
and could in nowise originate from a contemplation 
of the man himself. He was now a mass of obesity, 
unwieldy, and of feeble articulation, such as we oc- 
casionally see in individuals of objectionable habits, 
loaded with adipose deposits, "an aggravated agglo- 
meration of superabundant redundances.'^ More- 
over, Clinton possessed a peculiar disposition to be 
drawn toward those who enjoyed any thing Hke a 
literary taste, or were engaged as professors of 
knowledge, and who retained a fondness for reading. 
He himself was emphatically a book- worm : when- 
ever released from public cares, he might be found 
day or night with his volume in or at hand. As 
might be conjectured, his taste embraced a pro- 
digious variety ; but natural history was his most 
congenial study ; and he preserved the habit to 
the last of his life of enlisting individuals to dis- 
cover in the bookstores or at the stalls old and 
curious authors on physical science. No expense 



188 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

was spared to add to his library the noted worthies 
of bygone days. His literary messenger on one 
occasion notified him that a rare old father on 
natural history was to be obtained for some eighty 
dollars. The work was ordered by Clinton ; he 
was delighted on having secured it, and with 
hardly more than ferriage money in his pocket he 
returned to Albany ; but he had Aldrovandus 
with him. This anecdote is scarcely within the 
scope of a history of our pubhc system of educa- 
tion, but it is not irrelevant to illustrate something 
of the qualities of De Witt Clinton, the great in- 
stigator of our school system. 

The Free Academy, which, it has been very 
properly remarked, gives completeness to the sys- 
tem of public instruction, and is an integrant 
branch of the whole system for the enlightenment 
of the people, possesses the great advantage of a 
liberal system of education similar to that which 
is embraced in our colleges for the highest depart- 
ments of study. Indeed, few, if any, of our col- 
legiate establishments hold out so ample a course 
of instruction in classical literature, in modern 
languages, in mathematical and physical science. 
The existence of the Academy is brief, yet already 
have precious fruits been scattered widely over 
the land, to the wonder and admiration of the most 
appreciating minds. I, unfortunately for myself, 
am but in a limited degree acquainted with the 



FREE ACADEMY. 189 

professors of that great school ; hut if Dr. Gihhs 
is to he taken as a specimen of its teachers, un- 
houncled confidence may he reposed in the acqui- 
sitions of its scholars. I only repeat what is ut- 
tered daily, that the distinguished principal, Dr. 
Wehster, has solved the prohlem, how manifold 
are the benefits which may flow from a wise ad- 
ministration of able collegiate authority. 

Let me in all sincerity ask, in what other place 
may the poorest and the humblest child of indi- 
gence find instruction from the A, B, 0, to the 
highest branches of classical and scientific knowl- 
edge, through every stage of his study, without 
one dollar's expense to the recipient ; and all this, 
every device and measure, planned and accom- 
plished since our organization in 1804. Let all 
praise be given to our constituted authorities for 
this exemplar of their wisdom and patriotic fore- 
thought ; let, above all others, that capacious mind 
which is alike seen in the union of the Erie and 
the Hudson and in our noble system of education, 
become the theme of collegiate eloquence and liis- 
torical record. Let our children and their chil- 
dren's children keep within memory the names of 
Hawley, Bernard, Kandall, and Benedict. But 
this request is perhaps superfluous ; the bounty is 
ever before us, the givers cannot be forgotten. To 
those alive to local history and the origin of great 
practical ideas, says the accomplished essayist 



190 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Tuclierman, in his "biographical volume, daily ob- 
servation keeps fresh the memory of Clinton.* 

The transition is not altogether violent, in 
leaving one species of instruction for another — in 
dismissing the system of school education and 
taking up the Stage, so long reckoned a source of 
useful knowledge, and by many still deemed capa- 
ble of becoming an enlightened monitor. But 
with the drama, as with many other subjects that 
properly belong to a discourse accommodated to 
this occasion, I am subjected to a painful brevity ; 

* Most astounding disclosures were made at the London Edu- 
cational Conference in June last, 1856, on the great question, the 
enlightenment of the people. I extract from the report, which 
appeared in the Illustrated London News : " Notwithstanding all 
the voluntary efforts, all the benevolence, all the hberality of 
Churchmen and of Dissenters, of corporations and of individuals, 
there are in England and Wales, out of nearly five millions of 
children between the ages of three and fifteen years, little more 
than two millions who attend any school whatever, leaving 
2,861,848 — nearly three millions, — who are not in the receipt of 
school instruction." " Nor is even this state of things, bad as it 
is, the worst part of the case. Of the two millions of children 
who attend existing schools, we are informed by the Prince that 
only six hundred thousand — less than one-third — are above the 
age of nine. In other words, more than one-half of the poor 
children of England receive no school instruction at all, and two- 
thirds of the remainder are taken away from school at an age so 
early that it is quite impossible for them to have received any en- 
during benefit from school teaching. The result is, if these 
figures are correct, that only one child out of every eight in this 
rich, civilized, and Christian country, remains at school after its 
ninth year." 



THE DRAMA. 191 

for what adequate notions can be imparted within 
the few moments at command^ of the dramatic oc- 
currences of New York during the past fifty years ? 
It has so happened that for forty years of my life 
I have been, with slight intermissions, the medical 
adviser and physician of many of the leading 
heroes of the sock and buskin, from the arrival of 
the great George Frederick Cooke in 1810, to the 
departure of the classical Mac ready in 1849 ; and 
I am apprehensive that of all the individuals com- 
memorated in Dunlap's Biography of Cooke, I am 
perhaps the sole survivor. 

I cannot say that I have ever been stage-struck 
or dramatically mad in my admiration of the his- 
trionic profession ; yet as one ever gratified with 
the displays of intellectual power, I have expe- 
rienced the raptures inspired by genius, in a voca- 
tion which, while it holds the mirror up to nature, 
is the acknowledged school of oratory, and has re- 
ceived in all ages, among the refined, the counte- 
nance and support of many of the loftiest minds 
and most sympathizing hearts. Moreover, I think 
it not too much to say, that my professional inter- 
course with actors has enabled me to obtain a view 
of dramatic character and of dramatic life, which 
could scarcely be expected to fall within the scope 
of the mere beholder of scenic representation, who 
never perhaps had passed behind the foot-lights, 
or been familiar with that condition of physical 



192 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

and mental toil wMcli the ceremonies and per- 
formances due to " personation/' impose on the 
feelings of the successful artist. 

I take it for granted that no intelligent man 
will hold in doubt the fact, that the life of the 
player is one of severe trial, of great demands on 
the physical powers, of incessant mental anxiety, 
and of precarious rewards. Yet have I known 
many members of that calling filled with the 
largest benevolence and enriched with the graces 
which dignify human nature. The actor's life is 
especially subjected to the caprices of fortune ; 
the platform on which he stands is ever uncertain ; 
as a general truth he encounters adversity with 
more than ordinary fortitude. I have known 
many instances of this nature ; the mimic world 
has its stern realities not less than the actual, and 
the wardrobe no more protects its denizen than do 
the common habiliments of the ordinary citizen. 
" The life of an actor," says a modern essayist of 
the school of English undefiled, " is a severe trial 
of humanity. His temptations are many ; his 
fortitude, too, often ineffectual ; his success pre- 
carious. If he be resolute, uncontaminated by 
the society of his associates, and a genuine artist 
besides, he is worthy not only the praise of the 
moralist, but also deserving the admiration of the 
critic. The prejudice against the profession, like 
most prevailing prejudices, is founded on general 



THE DRAMA. 193 

trutli ; but it is frequently absurd and baseless."* 
If the stage has fallen from its high estate, and 
failed to raise the genius and to mend the heart, 
to elevate the moral sentiment by heroic action 
and sublime example, let not its sad decline rest 
solely with the representatives of Shakspeare and 
Jonson ; let something be ascribed to the revolu- 
tions of taste and to the mutability of popular 
opinion ; but more than all, let us suffer within 
ourselves the chagrin of self-condemnation, like 
the dyspeptic patient, who in searching for the 
causes of his own horrors, finds them to have 
originated from the pernicious aliment in which 
his disturbed propensities had led him most un- 
wittingly to indulge. " The love of the drama," 
says the poet Campbell, " is a public instinct, that 
requires to be regulated, but is too deep for eradi- 
cation. I am no such bigot for the stage," con- 
tinues he, '^ as to say that it is necessarily a school 
of morals ; for, by bad management, it may be 
made the reverse ; and I think, on the whole, that 
the drama rather follows than leads public morals." 
" The drama will exist," says Dunlap, ^^ in good 
or evil repute, to guide or mislead, whether legis- 
lators will it or not. The people will iiave it so. 
The choice of the legislator is only to render 

* Characters and Criticisms, by W. Alfred Jones, A. M., New 
York, Vol. 2, p. 182. 12mo. 1857. 

9 



194 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

that beneficial which may be otherwise.'^ The 
drama is legitimately the school of human life ; 
it has vast accommodations, but its origin is 
in the human heart ; in its nature it is the con- 
centration and the exposition of the passions and 
the doings of man. Let it cherish fidelity to its 
great trust ; let it so conduct itself as not to fall 
below the intelligence of its arbitrators ; never 
forgetting that the schoolmaster is abroad. The 
remedy is within grasp ; .and its restoration is not 
altogether a thing of fancy. The scholar, how- 
ever fastidious, cannot wholly disregard a theme 
which found favor among the lucubrations of the 
mighty Warburton : he who would j)enetrate into 
the ethics of human life need not suffer appre- 
hension of evil from studies which absorbed many 
of the precious hours of the great moralist, John- 
son ; nor can the Christian philosopher be afraid 
to reason on the subject with the example before 
him of Young, the successful author of the Re- 
venge, and the poet of the Night Thoughts, a 
work whose devotional excellence has made it a 
manual of closest study to millions of human souls, 
wherever revealed truth has been recognized. 

I am not so confident as to presume that what 
I may utter can have any influence on a New 
York community, either on the fortunes or destiny 
of the stage. It has been decried by the best of 
men, and it has been countenanced by the wisest. 



THE DRAMA, 195 

It was formerly supported by religious partialities, 
and every body is aware that it owes its origin to 
religion, and that the first actors were priests or 
missionaries. An illiterate multitude were thus 
enlightened, and the clergy with an inherent sa- 
gacity represented the wonders of belief and the 
actions of the gods in appropriate temples. Collier, 
with the zeal of an antiquary, has traced the origin 
of the " Miracle-Plays " or " Mysteries," as the 
source and foundation of the English national drama, 
and the connection between the miracle-plays con- 
sisting in the outset only of Scripture characters, 
and '^ Moral Plays," or ^' Moralities," represented 
by allegorical personages ; and he has aimed to 
show how the first, almost imperceptibly, deviated 
into the last, by the gradual intermixture of alle- 
gory with sacred history, until miracle-plays were 
finally superseded.''' ^'Mysteries" and "Moral- 
ities" were often made the vehicles of religious 
controversies. 

For a long while the stage was a school of in- 
struction, for manners and behavior, and on this ac- 
count it is still higher to be appreciated. Shak- 
spearehas taught more history to the masses than all 
the schoolmasters, from the time when the first ped- 
agogue was installed ; and Lord Chesterfield's dicta 
have proved a mere cipher compared to the opera- 

* Collier's Annals of the Stasre. 



196 HISTORIPAL DISCOURSE. 

tions which scenic influence has wrought in molli- 
fying the intercourse of society. Yet there is a 
progress in refinement which eclipses the exhibition 
of the stage, and he whose mind is stored with 
much knowledge, will abandon theatricals as hav- 
ing lost their former interest with him. It cer- 
tainly is a foe to hypocrisy, and that alone, with 
the real philanthropist, is no small recommendation. 
It proves a wondrous relief to the laborious man 
and the worn intellect, and is a happy succedaneum 
for diversions less beneficial to good morals and 
good health. Grant that the sphere of the stage 
is indeed local, and its displays fugacious, yet it 
leaves a lasting impression on the human heart. 
Its rich literature bears the impress of genius, and 
cannot be overlooked by the accomplished scholar. 
But I must break off here. Let those who would 
raise an indiscriminate outcry against the stage, 
read the calm and dispassionate Address of Dr. 
Bellows, lately delivered in the Academy of Music, 
before the Dramatic Fund Association. 

The history of the first introduction of the 
stage in the American colonies is full of perplexity. 
Dunlap, our leading dramatic historian, in his 
work on the American Theatre, a performance of 
acknowledged merit, has blended his facts with so 
many errors, that we strive in vain to derive from 
his pages a true knowledge of the subject. He 
was doubtless led into most of his difficulties by 



THE AMEEICAN COMPANY. 197 

too great reliance on the story given by Burk, in 
his History of Virginia. I have endeavored to make 
the case clearer, and have sought out curious facts 
in Parker's News Boy. The introduction of the 
drama in the American colonies was in this city, 
on Monday evening, the 26th of February, 1750, 
in a convenient room for the purpose, in one of the 
buildings which had belonged to the estate of Rip 
Van Dam (a renowned Knickerbocker) in Nassau 
street. The play was the historical tragedy of 
Richard the Third, written originally by Shak- 
speare, and altered by Colley Gibber, under the 
management of Lewis Hallam, whose family con- 
sisted of his wife, a son Lewis, and a younger son, 
Adam, with a niece, Miss Hallam. His elder son, 
Lewis, was but twelve years of age. Dunlap says, 
that he made his first appearance in September, 
1752, at Williamsburg, in Virginia. The younger, 
Adam, appeared in October, 1753, in this city, in 
the character of " Tom Thumb." He had a 
daughter, who became Mrs. Mattocks in England. 
It may be that this company, under manager 
Hallam, appeared next in Williamsburg ; but on 
the 15th of April, 1754, they opened in Philadel- 
phia with the " Fair Penitent.'' 

We have not before us the cast of the play 
(Richard the Third) enacted in this city. It pos- 
sesses so many dramatis personce, that we have 
little doubt that several of the company had to 



198 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

take double parts. Eigby, we may safely infer, 
enacted Richard Third. There was no accommo- 
dation of boxes, only pit and gallery. There was 
no farce after Richard Third. The permission for 
the performance was given by the British governor, 
Clinton. Lewis Hallam, at the age of twenty- 
nine, appeared in Lord Ogleby, the year after the 
comedy was written, in 1767. This part he played 
for forty years ; the last time in the Park Theatre, 
in 1807, and witnesses of this fact still survive. 
Manager Hallam died in Philadelphia in 1808. 
This company was generally designated by the 
name of the Old American Company, and Hallam 
the father of the American stage. 

Thus it ai)pears that this city has enjoyed the 
drama for upwards of one hundred years. On that 
fifty which had passed away before the estabHsh- 
ment of our Historical Society, I intend not now 
to enlarge. Suffice it to say, as to the character 
and abilities of the performers of the American 
company, our oldest playgoers were often heard to 
speak in terms of highest a23probation ; and when 
we enumerate Hallam, Henry, Harwood, Jefferson, 
Cooper, Fennell, Johnstone, Hodgkinson and his 
wife, Mrs. Oldmixon, and Mrs. Merry, we need not 
apprehend that their plaudits were unmerited. 
The names of several of these efficient actors of 
the olden times may be seen recorded on the bills 
which announced the arrival of Cooke. 



THE DRAMA. 199 

To one who contemplates the progress of art 
and education in our land, it will at once occur 
that with theatricals, as with instruction generally, 
we depended almost altogether upon supplies from 
abroad. Our preachers, our professors in colleges, 
our artists, our books, were rarely indigenous, and 
the stage illustrates our early rehance on the 
mother country in an equal, if not in a greater 
degree, than in any of the other vocations of busy 
life. If our condition was once so restricted that 
farmer Giles imported from beyond the seas wooden 
axe-handles when the country was overrun with 
forests, surely it may be pronounced to have been 
admissible that a truthful Cordelia might be in- 
cluded among importable articles, for the praise- 
worthy design of disciplining the humanities of 
the man of refinement. At the time of the first 
representation of Eichard the Third, animadver- 
sions appeared on the corruptions of the stage ; 
but, in its defence, Whitfield is cited, inasmuch 
as he had ascribed his inimitable gesture and 
bewitching address to his having acted in his 
youth ; and the writer moreover adds, with great 
earnestness, that the abuse of a thing against its 
■use is no argument, as there is nothing in thi^** 
world but must fall before such demolishing kind 
of logic. There was little dramatic criticism, 
however, among us in the earlier days of the 
theatre. 



200 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

The chronicler who would be faithful to the 
history of the stage in New York would be com- 
pelled to say something concerning that period 
which elapsed between the commencement of the 
great American war .of 1776, and its end in 1783. 
During that interval the English plays of Garrick, 
Foote, Cumberland, Colman, O'Keefe, Sheridan, 
and others, reached from time to time this coun- 
try, and were enacted by the officers of the army 
and navy, and by select aids in private or social 
circles ; and a remarkable peculiarity of the times 
seems to have been, that it was quite a common 
circumstance to appropriate or designate some 
leading or prominent individual among the inhab- 
itants of the city as the character drawn by the 
dramatist abroad. Qui capit, ille facit. Thus, 
when the Busy Body appeared, it was thought 
that Dr. Atwood would be the best exemplar of it. 
Atwood, as all who hear me probably know, was 
the first practitioner of medicine in this city who 
regularly assumed, by advertisement, the functions 
of a male accoucheur. He obtained confidence, 
notwithstanding the novelty of the attempt. At- 
wood knew every thing of every family ; he 
abounded in anecdote, but his company was more 
courted than admired. He at one time possessed, 
by inheritance, great wealth, but died poor, through 
the conduct of his son Charles. 

When Laugh and Grow Fat appeared, the 



THE DRAMA OF THE REVOLUTION. 201 

public said it well fitted the case of Mortier. He 
was a cheerful old gentleman and paymaster to the 
British army ; but the leanest of all human beings, 
according to the MS. I lately inspected of Mr. 
John Moore. He was almost diaphanous. Mortier 
built the great mansion on the Trinity Church 
grounds, to which I have already alluded in my 
account of Col. Burr's residence. 

It would seem that during these times an Ode 
to love was recited ; the sympathetic public as- 
cribed it to old Judge Horsmanden, so famous in 
the Negro Plot, who had married at seventy years 
of age. The Wheel of Fortune was made appli- 
cable to Governor Gage, who had arrived in this 
country as a captain in 1756, in the old French 
war, and in 1775 was commander-in-chief of the 
British army. The Male Coquette was, by a sort 
of unanimous concurrence, applied to Dr. James 
Smith, the brother of the historian of New York, 
the man whom I described in my sketch of Chris- 
topher Colles as writing madrigals for the youngs 
ladies. He must have pursued the game nearly 
half a century. When Anacreon Moore visited 
this city in 1802-3, and while he was sequestered 
behind the Dunderbarracks on the Hudson, on ac- 
count of his Bermuda troubles. Smith had the te- 
merity to offer with renewed vigor his poetic obla- 
tions on the altar of love. I knew him well. He 
was an M.D. of Leyden. I have often seen him, 
9* 



202 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

when he had arrived at the age of seventy and up- 
ward, attired in velvet coat, with his gold snuff- 
box in one hand, pressing forward with his vast 
projecting shirt frills, discolored with the drippings 
of his box, and his little brochure of poetry in the 
other hand, tottering through the streets, engaged 
in distributing to the chosen fair his rhyming pro- 
ducts : 

" He reeled as though he scarce could stand, 
Yet Cupid led him by the hand." 

When professor of chemistry in Columbia College, 
then called King's, his flowery diction with the 
students about the " roimd-tops '' of science, greatly 
disturbed both analysis and synthesis. Hempstead 
Plains was brought forward in those times, most 
probably an indigenous work. It is affirmed that 
it alluded to a descendant of one of the prominent 
members of the affluent Beekman family, Gerardus, 
a great sportsman, who secured the rejDutation of 
having killed more birds than any other man that 
ever lived. He shot deer in the city Common 
(now Park), and antlers, the trophies of his skill, 
are yet preserved among his descendants as curi- 
osities to mark the city's progress. He kept a 
diary of his gunnery. I need scarcely add that 
Beekman street received its name from these first 
settlers. 

During the possession of the city by the Brit- 



LAMBERTUS DE RHONDE. 203 

ish, I find that comparatively little deference was 
paid to the condition of the ministry, not of the 
Episcopate, by the men in power, and more par- 
ticularly by the military order. Lampoons on the 
clergy were not unfrequent, particularly if they 
were found tinctured with Whigism. Lambertus 
de Ehonde, whom our learned Vice President, Dr. 
De Witt, has faithfully recorded in his Discourse 
and History of the North Dutch Church, was one 
of those against whom the shafts of ridicule were 
aimed. De Rhonde was thoroughly educated in 
Holland, and preached here in the Dutch lan- 
guage — he had a long career. His ardor attracted 
notice, and he came under the lashes of the abet- 
tors of royalty. He was accordingly illustrated in 
return for his fervor and earnestness, by a farce 
called Hell in a Smoke. This worthy man lived 
until 1795, and died honored and respected. 

But we must hasten to times nearer our own. 
About the beginning* of the second part of the 
designated one hundred years, the Morning Chron- 
icle, a journal of much taste in literature and the 
arts, edited by Dr. Peter Irving, and the New 
York Evening Post, edited by William Coleman, 
were the prominent paj)ers in which any thing like 
regular theatrical criticisms was published. In 
the former a series of articles on plays and actors 
was printed in 1802-3, over the signature of Jona- 
than Oldstyle. At the time of their appearance 



204 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

they were generally ascribed to the accomplished 
editor, Dr. Irving, who enjoyed great distinction 
for classical acquisition and belles-lettres knowl- 
edge. I knew him only in his advanced life, when 
illness had nearly exhausted his frame : yet he 
was most courteous, refined, and engaging. He 
was a graduate in medicine of Columbia College. 
Years elapsed before the real author became 
known. They are, I believe, among the earliest 
literary efforts of our countryman, Washington 
Irving, then about the nineteenth year of his age. 
These criticisms were not wanting in free ani- 
madversion ; yet betrayed something of that 
genial humor which so amply abounds in several 
of the subsequent writings of that eminent author. 
Coleman, a man of culture and of impulse, often 
supphed the city with his lucubrations, and aimea 
to settle all other criticisms by his individual ver- 
dict. He was often furnished wdth articles of pe- 
culiar merit on acting and actors, by John Wells, 
afterwards the renowned lawyer, by William John- 
son, the well-remembered reporter, and by our 
lamented Anthony Bleecker. WiU Wizzard, in 
the Salmagundi of 1807, also favored the town 
v^th two or three theatricals on the histrionic 
talents of the Old Park Theatre. 

The arrival of Cooke in this country consti- 
tutes the great epoch in the progress of the drama, 
and is the period at which the historian of the 



G. F. COOKE. 205 

American stage turns to contemplate the wonders 
of scenic power. On the night of the 21st of No- 
vemher, 1810, Cooke appeared at the Park The- 
atre in Richard Third, before an unprecedentedly 
crowded house. His vast renown had preceded 
him ; but every anticipation was more than real- 
ized. He had reached his fifty-fourth year, yet 
possessed all the physical energies of thirty, profit- 
ing largely on the score of health by his sea voy- 
age. The old playgoers, by his expositions, dis- 
covered a mine of wealth in Shakspeare, now first 
opened. His commanding person, his expressive 
countenance, his elevated front, his eye, his every 
feature and movement, his intonations, showed 
the great master who eclipsed all predecessors. 
His capacious intellecj;, his boldness and origi- 
nality, at once convinced his hearers of the supe- 
riority of his study and his matchless compre- 
hension of his great author. The critics pro- 
nounced him the first of hving actors : he engrossed 
all minds. It must suffice at this time to observe, 
that this remarkable man and performer, during 
his whole career in the several cities of the Union, 
sustained his dramatic reputation unimpaired. 
The sad infirmity which too often laid hold of 
him, to the casual detriment of his great abihties, 
was dealt with by the public more in pity than in 
anger ; and indeed he seemed to be at times be- 
loved the more for the dangers he had passed. 



206 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Dunlap appears througliout his whole biography 
to have delighted more to record his inebriation, 
than to unfold his great professional powers. Per- 
haps it was easier to describe a debauch than to 
analyze the qualities of a sublime genius. 

At this late date, after a lapse of nearly half a 
century, it might be pronounced foolishness to 
offer even a passing remark on Cooke's peculiar 
merits in portraying individual character. Gibber 
has said, the momentary beauties flowing from an 
harmonious elocution, cannot, like those of poetry, 
be their own record, and everybody has felt the 
force of the observation. I had seen little of the 
stage before I saw Cooke, and must therefore hold 
in comparison, in the little that I utter, the im- 
pressions experienced from^ actors of a later date. 
Cooke's Shylock, a new reading to the western 
world, was a most impassioned exhibition. His 
aquiline nose was of itself a legacy here. The re- 
vengeful Jew made his great and successful im- 
pression with Tubal, and in the trial scene his 
triumph was complete. lago, with Cooke, was a 
more palpable and consummate villain than with 
any other actor I have subsequently seen, I think 
I have seen a better Macbeth ; the transitions of 
Cooke were scarcely immediate enough for the 
timid, hesitating, wavering monarch. His Sir 
Giles Overreach was not so terrifically impressive 
as that of Kean. His Kitely was an intellectual 



G. F. COOKE. 207 

repast. His Lear verified the opinion of Johnson 
concerning that tragedy. " There is no play," 
says he, " which so much agitates our passions 
and interests our curiosity." As a whole, Cooke's 
performance of the wretched monarch was one of 
great credit, and possessed points of exquisite con- 
ception and felicity, as when he interrogates the 
Thehan philosopher, " What is the cause of thun- 
der ? '' Cooke's Sir Pertinax, for comic force, ver- 
satility of features, blandishments, inimitable plia- 
bility of address, and perfect personation of char- 
acter, is acknowledged to have greatly surpassed 
Macklin's. A like tribute is due to his Sir Archy 
M' Sarcasm. I believe that no actor in any one 
part within the compass of the entire drama, ever 
excelled therein to an equal degree as did Mr. 
Cooke in the Scotch character. The impression 
created by its representation is too deep to be ob- 
literated while one surviving witness remains. It 
was his greatest performance, and was rendered 
the more acceptable by his wonderful enunciation 
of the Scotch dialect. In one of my medical 
visits to him at the Old Tontine, his first residence 
in New York, I incidentally spoke to him con- 
cerning his personation of Sir Pertinax, and stated 
all the town had concluded he was a Scotchman. 
" They have the same opinion of me in Scotland," 
said he ; "I am an Englishman." And how, sir, 
did you acquire so profound a knowledge of the 



208 HISTOBICAL DISCOURSE. 

Scotch accentuation ? I rejoined. " I studied 
more than two and a half years in my own room, 
with repeated intercourse with Scotch society, in 
order to master the Scottish dialect, before I ven- 
tured to appear on the boards in Edinburgh, as 
Sir Pertinax, and when I did, Sawney took me 
for a native. . It was the hardest task I ever un- 
dertook." 

Cooke justly demands a greater space than 
this occasion warrants ; but the able critical pens 
of the time have commemorated his achievements, 
and the veteran Wood, in his j)ersonal reminis- 
cences of the stage, has dealt with him impar- 
tially, and delineated his character with great 
fidelity. He was of a kindly disposition, of great 
benevolence, and filled with charitable impulses. 
His strong mental powers were improved by read- 
ing, yet more by observation and a study of man- 
kind. Self-reliance was his distinguishing quality ; 
few ever were at any time able to overcome his de- 
termination. His resolves scarcely ever yielded. 
When not influenced by the goblet, his conver- 
sation was instructive and his manners urbane ; 
he had a tear for distress, and a hand of liberality 
for want. He was a great original, and had the 
logic within himself to justify innovation. His 
master was nature, and he would submit to no ar- 
tificial rhetoric. He thought much of Kemble, 
and every thing of Garrick, both of whom he had 



G. F. COOKE. 209 

seen perform. He cherislied an exalted idea of his 
art, and demanded deference from the menial and the 
noble. He was thoroughly imbued with the value 
of FrankHn's aphorism, " If you make a sheep of 
yourself, the wolves will devour you.'' He toler- 
ated no invasion of his rights. And yet that one 
stain on his character, his mania for drink (a peri- 
odical disease, often of some duration), dethroned 
his high purpose, and at times degraded him below 
the dignity of man. In that condition his whole 
nature was altered, and his appearance almost dia- 
bolical ; you dwindled under his indignant frown ; 
no violence was like his ; abuse of kindest friends, 
extravagance beyond limits, obstinacy invincible. 
On the return of right reason, he would cast a 
withering glance at those around him, and ask, 
" "What part is George Frederick Cooke placarded 
for to-night .^ " 

After one of those catastrophes to which I 
have alluded, I paid him a visit at early afternoon, 
the better to secure his attendance at the theatre. 
He was seated at his table, with many decanters, 
all exhausted, save two or three appropriated for 
candlesticks, the lights in full blaze. He had not 
rested for some thirty hours or more. With much 
ado, aided by Price the manager, he was persuaded 
to enter the carriage waiting at the door to take 
him to the play-house. It was a stormy night. 
He repaired to the green room, and was soon ready. 



210- HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

Price saw he was the worse from excess, hut the 
public were not to he disappointed. " Let him/' 
says the manager, " only get before the lights and 
the receipts are secure." Within the wonted time 
Cooke entered on his part, the Duke of Gloster. 
The public were unanimous in their decision, that 
he never performed with greater satisfaction. As 
he left the house he whispered, " Have I not 
pleased the Yankee Doodles ? " Hardly twenty- 
four hours after this memorable night, he scattered 
.some $400 among the needy and the solicitous, 
and took refreshment in a sound sleep. A strikiog 
peculiarity often marked the conduct of Cooke : 
he was the most indifferent of mortals to the 
results which might be attendant on his folly and 
his recklessness. When his society was sohcited 
by the highest in literature and the arts, he might 
determine to while away a limited leisure among 
the illiterate and the vulgar, and yet none was so 
fastidious in the demands of courtesy. When the 
painter Stuart was engaged with the delineation 
of his noble features, he chose to select those hours 
for sleeping ; yet the great artist triumphed and 
satisfied his liberal patron. Price. Stuart proved 
a match for him, by occasionally raising the hd of 
his eye. On the night of his benefit, the most 
memorable of his career in New York, with a 
house crowded to suffocation, he abused public 
confidence, and had nothing to say but that 



G. F. COOKE. 



211 



Cato had full right to take liberty with his 
senate. 

Throbbing invades the heart when narrating 
the career of this extraordinary man, of herculean 
constitution, so abundant in recuperative energies ; 
of faculties so rare^ and so sublime, cut off so early. 
In consultation with Drs. Maclean and Hosack I 
often attended him, and in his last illness passed 
most of my time with him until the closing scene. 
He died September, 1812. Serous effusion of 
the chest and abdomen were the immediate cause 
of his death. He was conscious to the last and 
resigned to his fate. Cooke attracted a mighty 
notice when with his dignified mien and stately 
person, attired as the old English gentleman, he 
walked Broadway. His funeral was an imposing 
spectacle. The reverend the clergy, the physicians, 
the members of the bar, officers of the army and 
navy, the literati and men of science, the mem- 
bers of the dramatic corps, and a large concourse 
of citizens moved in the procession. My worthy 
friend, George B. Rapelye, is the only survivor 
of the long train, whom I can now call to mind. 
The quiet Sabbath added to the solemnity. He 
nad no kindred to follow in the procession, but 
there were many real mourners. The sketches of 
Mr. Cooke in the Dramatic Mirror of Philadelphia, 
executed by Leslie, then a boy, and now the artist 



212 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

of European celebrity, are of most remarkable 
fidelity. 

The professional triumphs of Cooke led Holman 
Boon after to visit America. He arrived in 1812, 
and saw bis old friend on bis dying bed. Holman 
bad a checkered career. He was an Oxford scholar, 
and was granted the honors of the University even 
after be had become attached to the stage. On 
assuming the civilian's gown, be delivered with 
great success a Latin oration ; the eclat which 
followed his oratorical displays at the Sobo Acad- 
emy_, led him to abandon theology and adopt the 
stage. He made a great bit in Orestes, and his 
appearance as Romeo was a decided triumph. 
His Lord Townley won him most applause in New 
York, and was deemed a finished performance. 
The elegant scholarship of Holman, bis rigid tem- 
perance, surpassing all I bad seen in any other 
person, and bis fidebty to all obligations, secured 
him a consideration which enhanced the moral es- 
timation of the dramatic corps. His nature was 
truly noble. His pecuniary resources were sacri- 
ficed in bis ambitious efforts to enhance dramatic 
taste, and add splendor to scenic representation. 
He was the first to give me an idea of the extent 
of works on dramatic literature. His books on 
costumes alone formed quite a library. Impaired 
health led him to seek relief at the watering-place, 
Rockaway, where be was seized with a fatal apo- 



J. HOWARD PAYNE. 213 

plexy, in August, 1817. The journals abroad 
stated that he lost his life by one of those remark- 
able phenomena which sometimes signalize our 
chmate, a sort of epidemical lightning, by which 
himself and several of his family were stricken 
down. We gave him a village funeral, most re- 
spectable in numbers, at the head of w^hich, with 
due solemnity, walked the long-remembered old 
Joseph Tyler, the comedian, who has often trod 
the stage with Garrick, and Charles Gilfert, the 
musical composer, who subsequently married Hoi-" 
man's daughter. 

There are about this period of the drama, as- 
sociated with Cooke, many theatrical celebrities, 
whose names might justly find a record here : 
many whom the critics lauded, and the spectators 
admired. Among the foremost is John Howard 
Payne, the American Koscius, who was signalized 
for his Nerval, and his playing Edgar to Cooke's 
Lear. As an author, Payne's Brutus, and his 
Home Sweet Home, have secured him a world- 
wide renown. I became acquainted with him as 
the editor of the Thespian Mirror, when he was 
about thirteen years of age. A more engaging 
youth could not be imagined ; he won all hearts 
by the beauty of his person, and his captivating 
address, the premature richness of his mind, and 
his chaste and flowing utterance. But I will ab- 
stain from further notice of him on this occasion ; 



214 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

every reader enamored of the story of his eventful 
life, with the vicissitudes of authorship, of play- 
wrights, and of actors, will satisfy his desires by 
turning to the instructive pages of Duyckinck's 
Cyclopaedia of American Literature. 

A list of the most popular actors, male and 
female, of that period, and of some subsequent 
years, would necessarily include Jefferson, Simpson, 
Wood, Hogg, Hilson, Barnes, Bernard, Barret, 
the Placides, Conway, James Wallack, Mrs. Old- 
mixon, Mrs. Johnson, Miss Johnson, Mrs. Wheat- 
ley, Mrs. Darley, Mrs. Gilfert, and Mrs. Holman. 
As prominent in this long catalogue, James Wal- 
lack might be permitted to stand first, as a trage- 
dian of powers, and as a comic performer of re- 
markable capabilities. His Shaksperian range and 
his Dick Dashall are enough for present citation. 
Wallack is still with us, and continues as the con- 
necting link between the old and new order of 
theatrical affairs. The acting drama of these 
times, fairly set forth, would also introduce that 
distinguished American, James Hackett, whose 
Falstaff has been the theme of applause from 
even the lips of fastidious critics, and whose Yan- 
kee characters have stamped his powers with the 
bold impress of originahty. Moreover, Hackett, 
in his correspondence on Hamlet with that able 
scholar, John Quincy Adams, has given us proofs 
that he had trained himself in a deep study of the 



EDMUND SIMPSON. 215 

philosophy of Shakspeare. It would not be un- 
profitable to dwell upon the capabilities of Edmund 
Simpson, whose range of characters was most ex- 
tensive, and whose talents manifested deep pene- 
tration in a broad expanse of dramatic individual- 
ities. He was for many years the active manager 
of the Park Theatre, and his systematic attention 
to his business gave satisfaction to authors, actors, 
and the public. No pendulum could be more 
regular than Simpson in his engagements : watch 
the dial plate of the City Hall, and in all seasons 
and in all weather you might see him in his daily 
walk in Broadway towards old Drury at the same 
spot, within the same hour, at the same minute. 
The passers-by often used him as a chronometer. 
His ambition to gratify the taste of the play- 
goers led him to seek the highest histrionic talent, 
a task of some perplexity to gratify a community 
who had enjoyed Hallam and Hodgkinson, T waits, 
the Placides, Mrs. Merry, Mrs. Oldmixon, Mrs. 
Johnson. But Simpson found Hilson and Barnes, 
Yates, Spiller, and Barret, Cooper and Fennell, 
Mrs. Mason, &c. With the exception of the 
younger Placide and Greorge Barret, the grave 
has closed upon all these heroes and heroines. Gen- 
tleman George, whom I saw on what I thought 
his deathbed, nearly fifty years ago, has only re- 
cently retired from the stage,, and lives, I believe, 
on Long Island, with the prospect of approaching 



216 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

the age of the indurated Irishman, Macklin. Hen- 
ry Placide still sustains his almost unrivalled 
powers as the great comedian. But here I must 
forbear the recital of a thousand circumstances in- 
cident to dramatic life. I may bo justified in 
remarking that, professionally, I became acquaint- 
ed with many of these players, and can testify 
to the repeated evidences they afforded, from 
time to time, of their charitable feelings for the 
relief of suffering humanity, and their excellent 
principles in the conduct of life. At a little later 
date we find the boards enriched by George Bart- 
ley and his wife, formerly a Miss Smith, to whom 
Moore dedicated a series of his Irish melodies. 
His Autolychus, his Sir Anthony Absolute, and 
his Falstaff, wiU long hold possession of the mem- 
ory, and Mrs. Bartley, enacting the Ode on the 
Passions, was a consummation of artistic skill 
equally rare and entrancing. 

We had a doubtful case of royalty on our 
boards at the Old Park Theatre, during the man- 
agement of Simpson and Price, without even the 
play-goers being well apprised of the fact. This 
occurrence took place in the person of Mrs. Alsop, 
who had been sent out by the manager, Price, from 
London. She signalized herself by her performance 
of the Actress of All Work, and by some efforts 
in comedy of tolerable acceptance. She needed 
more grace and beauty than nature had favored 



MRS. ALSOP. 217 

her with, yet her mental qualities were much 
ahove mediocrity. Like the opium eaters, De 
Quincy and Coleridge, and the well-remembered 
declaimer, Ogilvie, the Scotch orator, and many 
others, she demanded the liberal use of narcotics 
to elevate her for the time being in her mimic pro- 
fession. The consequence was impaired health, 
followed by great dejection of spirits and prostra- 
tion of strength. But other causes still more 
potent led to her hasty loss of life. She was a 
daughter of Mrs. Jordan, whose relationship with 
the Duke of Clarence, afterwards William the 
Fourth, is recorded history. Aware of her origin, 
and necessitated in a foreign land to derive her 
precarious maintenance from the stage, after a few 
months she terminated her earthly career by an 
overdose of laudanum. When I arrived at her 
lodgings she was just breathing her last. She died 
in Greenwich street, near Dey ; and Spiller, the 
comedian, and myself, sought a burial spot for 
her. The requirement of a doctor's certificate for 
the cause of death was not then exacted as now- 
adays. I give these particulars to counteract 
errors, as it has been stated she closed her career 
during a tour through the Southern States. My 
indignation was somewhat awakened at the occur- 
rence of this unhappy woman's end ; anguish of 
mind, I think, must have wrought the work of 
destruction. Contrary to my usual practice with 
10 



'218 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

the poor, I sent a medical charge to His Majesty 
for services rendered ; but like most bills against 
those Hanoverian monarchs, it remains non-ac- 
cepted up to the present hour. I necessarily act, 
as I am informed the mercantile world sometimes 
do, place it among my deferred stock, though I am 
ready to sell out upon application. 

Still a little later, and a flood of histrionic 
talents seems almost to have overwhelmed us, in 
the persons of Kean, Matthews, and Macready. 
He who would draw the veritable portraiture and 
histrionic powers of these remarkable men, might 
justly claim psychological and descriptive instincts 
of the highest order. They were not all of equal 
or of like merits. They were all, however, ele- 
vated students, under difficulties, and long strug- 
gled against the assaults of a vituperative press 
and an incredulous public ; they all in the end 
secured the glories of a great success. With Kean 
I may say I was most intimate. He won my 
feelings and admiration from the moment of my 
first interview with him. Association and obser- 
vation convinced me that he added to a mind of 
various culture the resources of original intellect ; 
that he was frank and open-hearted, often too 
much so, to tally with worldly wisdom. I was 
taught by his expositions in private, as well as by 
his histrionic displays, that the great secret of the 
actor's art depended upon a scrutinizing analysis 



EDMUND KEAN. 219 

of the mutual play of mind and matter, the reflex 
power of mental transactions on organic structure. 
His little, but well-wrought, strong frame, seemed 
made up of a tissue of nerves. Every sense ap- 
peared capable of immediate impression, and each 
impression having within itself a flexibility truly 
wondrous. The drudgery of his early life had 
given a pliability to his muscular powers that ren- 
dered him the most dexterous harlequin, the most 
graceful fencer, the most finished gentleman, the 
most insidious lover, the most terrific tragedian. 
The Five Courts could not boast a more skilful 
artist of the ring, and Garrick, if half that is said 
be true, might have won a grace from him. He 
had read history, and all concerning Shakspeare 
was familiar to him : times, costumes, habits, and 
the manners of the age. He had dipped into 
phrenology, and was a physiognomist of rare dis- 
cernment. His analysis of characters who visited 
him, to do homage to his renown, often struck me 
with astonishment. His eye was the brightest 
and most penetrating any mortal could boast, an 
intellectual telegraph. Dr. Young, borrowing, I 
suppose, from Aristotle, says that terror and pity 
are the two pulses of tragedy ; that Kean had 
these at command, every spectator of his Richard 
and Sir Giles, of his Lear and his Othello, is 
ready to grant. His transitions from gay to grave, 
yielded proofs of his capacity over the passions. 



220 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

He knew almost instinctively the feelings of the 
house, whether an appreciating audience was as- 
sembled or not, and soon decided the case, often 
by the earliest efforts he wrought. He was proud 
as the representative of Shakspeare, but told me 
a hundred times that he detested the profession 
of the actor. He loved Shakspeare, though the 
hardest study to grapple with, because, among 
other reasons, when once in memory he was a 
fixture, his language, he added, was so stickable. 
Though I was with him almost daily during his 
visits among us, I never knew him to look at the 
writings of the great poet, save once with King 
John, for any preparation for the stage ; he very 
seldom attended rehearsals, and yet, during all his 
performances here, he never once disappointed the 
public, even when I knew him suffering from 
bodily ills that might have kept a hero on his 
couch. There is something marvellous in that 
function, memory. The metaphysician, Dugald 
Stewart, was astounded when Henderson, after 
reading a newspaper once, repeated such a por- 
tion as seemed to him wonderful. A like oc- 
currence took place with our Hodgkinson. He 
made a trifling wager that within an hour he 
could commit to memory a page of a newspaper, 
cross reading, and he won. Kean told me that 
the parts of modern dramas, such, for example, as 
De Montfort, Bertram, and the like, could not 



EDMUND KEAN. 221 

thus be retained. Henderson told Dugald Stewart 
that habit produced that power of retention. Has 
the memory, like that peculiar faculty of calcula- 
tion which Zera Colburn possessed, some anomalous 
function not yet unravelled ? 

It is well known that Kean, at one period of 
his histrionic career, enjoyed the unbounded ad- 
miration of the Scotch metropolis ; and it is re- 
corded that the Highland Society honored him 
w^ith a magnificent sword for his highly wrought 
performance of Macbeth. He on several occasions 
adverted to the circumstance of old Sir John Sin- 
clair's flattering correspondence on the subject. 
Kean, if report be true, was invited to a choice 
meeting at Edinburgh, where were summoned 
many of the philosophers, professors, and critics 
usually congregated in that enlightened city. 
Scott and Wilson, I take it, were of the number, 
headed by the octogenarian, Henry Mackenzie, 
the " Man of Feeling," president of the Highland 
Society. It was easy to foresee, that such an op- 
portunity would not be permitted to escape such a 
scholastic board without some interrogatories being 
put to the great dramatic hero, on the genius of 
Shakspeare, and on the eloquence which elucidated 
him. The old professors of rhetoric had too long 
handled the square and compass in their Chiro- 
mania not to feel desirous of hearing if some new 
postulates might not be assumed, whose excellence 



222 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

miglit advance their science. My old friend, Jolin 
Pillans, of the High School, broached the subject. 
Kean had little to disclose ; yet that little had to 
suffice. He had no harangue on eloquence to de- 
liver. He maintained that Shakspeare was his 
own interpreter, by his intensity and the wonder- 
ful genius of his language. Shakspeare, he con- 
tinued, was a study ; his deep and scrutinizing 
research into human nature, and his sublime and 
pathetic muse, were to be comprehended only by 
a capacity alive to his mighty purposes. He had 
no rhetorician's laws to expound. If a higher 
estimate was at any time j)laced upon his perform- 
ances than upon those of some others who fulfilled 
the severe calling of the actor, he thought it might 
be due in part to the devotion which he bestowed 
on the author, and the conceptions engendered by 
reflection. I have overlooked, said he, the school- 
men, and while I assume no lofty claims, I have 
thought more of intonation than of gesticulation. 
It is the utterance of human feelings which rises 
superior to the rules which the professor of rhet- 
oric enjoins. It is the sympathy of mental im- 
pression that acts. I forgot the affections of art, 
and relied upon the emotions of the soul. It is 
human nature that gives her promptings. Kean 
rejected the cadence, or very rarely had recourse to 
it : it was at war with a successful termination of 
speech. Sententious thought is cut off, and too 



, EDMUND KEAN. 223 

often loses its effective power by that rule. He 
considered, the low modulation at the end too 
often destructive to a full comprehension of the 
sentence. Popular oratory seems more and more 
to reject it as an obsolete law, and I think, from 
daily observation, that our living exemplars of 
oratorical power, as Everett, Hawks, and others, 
practically carry out Kean's innovation. 

I interrogated Kean, at one of those intel- 
lectual recreations which now and then occurred 
in New York, if no other writer could be pointed 
out whose language might awaken similar emotions 
by elucidation. The funeral service of the Church, 
he replied, will demonstrate the capabilities of the 
speaker. When a new candidate for histrionic 
patronage waits at Old Drury, he is perhaps tested 
by the committee to declaim the speech over the 
dead body of Ceesar, or the opening address of 
Kichard the Third, or perhaps something from 
that mawkish lover, Komeo ; or he may be re- 
quested to read a portion of the funeral service of 
the Church ; this last answers as well as any thing 
from Shakspeare. We have nothing higher in 
eloquence ; nothing more effective, and the quali- 
fications of the speaker are often by such a crite- 
rion determined upon.* I myself shall only add 

* It is only within a few months that Garrick's work, Direc- 
tions for the reading of the Liturgy, has been republished in 
"Loudon. 



224 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

that Kean was controlled by an inherent sagacity, 
and, as events proved, that sagacity was convincing. 
The turmoils of the mind which led to such re- 
sults, he could not expound. Aided by a masterly 
judgment, he knew where the golden treasures of 
the poet were buried, and his genius knew how 
and when to bring them to light, and to give them 
their pecuhar force. 

Kean's success was not equal in all characters, 
and he frankly declared it. But how often has 
this proved to be the case with others ! Kemble 
could not excel in Kichard the Third or in Sir 
Edward Mortimer, and Kean could not approach 
the excellence of Kemble's Coriolanus. Miss 
O'Neil, when she played Mrs. Haller, proved that 
the pathetic had scarcely entered the bosom of Mrs. 
Siddons. Kean's scope was too wide for any mor- 
tal to cherish a design so presumptuous as univer- 
sal success ; but the impartial and well-informed 
historiographer of the stage will allow, that no 
predecessor in Kean's vocation ever excelled in so 
great a degree in such numerous and diversified 
delineations of the products of the dramatic art. 
And to what cause for such success a.re we to look, 
but to that vast capacity which original genius 
had planted within him ; to that boldness that 
dreaded not a new path, to that self-reliance which 
trained him, by untiring industry, to his assigned 
duty ; to that confidence which he cherished, that 



EDMUND KEAN. 225 

the artificial school of form and mannerism, with 
its monotonous tone, was rebellious to flexible 
nature, and must in time yield to those diviner 
agents residing in the human breast ? In the 
mechanics of ordinary life there might be such 
laws, and admiration excited at the regularity of 
the pendulum, but the intellectual was a subtle 
ether not to be thus controlled. The service in 
which he had enlisted, as interpreter and expositor 
of the Bard of Avon, demanded that the passions 
have fair play, and that it were an absurdity to 
restrain the emotions of the soul by .the laws of 
the pedagogue. His heart was his prompter — his 
mental sagacity his guide. Never has an actor 
appeared who owed less to the acting of others ; 
he disdained imitation ; he was himself alone. 
Need we have doubted the ultimate success of 
such heroism ? 

How vastly is his merit enhanced when we 
consider the renowned individuals who had had 
possession of the stage for some one or two ages 
prior to his entree in London, whose memories 
still lingered there, and further recollect the abili- 
ties of those, too, who, at the very time when he 
made his debut at Old Drury, were still the actual 
properties of the dramatic world, and had secured 
the homage of the British nation : the Kembles, 
Young, Mrs. Siddons, and we may add. Miss 
O'Neil. The verdict had gone forth that these 
10* 



226 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

artists could do no wrong ; yet the little man, who 
had feasted sumptuously on herring at a shilling a 
week, who had studied Shakspeare at the Cock 
and Bottle, who had enacted him amidst the 
clanking chains of a prison, appears as Shylock. 
The actors and the audience, one and all, dismiss 
every douht ; a new revelation is unfolded, and 
the intellect of the most intellectual critics is ex- 
hausted in ink and paper in laudation ; the poly- 
glot is ransacked for new phrases of approhation. 
The little man, but mighty actor, assumes a suc- 
cession of Shakspearian characters, and London is 
taken, as if by storm. Hazlett declares that Mr. 
Kean's appearance is the first gleam of genius 
breaking athwart the gloom of the stage ; the dry 
bones shake, and the mighty Kemble exclaims, 
" He acts terribly in earnest ! '' Coleridge says, 
" To see Kean act is reading Shakspeare by light- 
ning ; " and Byron, the immortal bard, bursts forth : 

" Thou art the sun's bright child ! 



The genius that irradiates thy mind 
Caught all its purity and light from heaven. 
Thine is the task, with mastery most perfect, 
To bind the passions captive in thy train I 
Each crystal tear, that slumbers in the depth 
Of feeling's fountain, doth obey thy call ! 
There's not a joy or sorrow mortals prove, 
Or passion to humility allied, 
But tribute of allegiance owes to thee. 
The shrine thou worshippest is Nature's self— 
The only altar genius deigns to seek. 



EDMUND KEAN. 227 

Thine ofiFering — a bold and burning mind, 
Whose impulse guides thee to the realms of fame, 
Where, crowned with well-earned laurels, all thine own, 
I herald thee to immortality." 

To demonstrate that his empire was not alone, 
Shakspeare and the lofty tragic writers, he as- 
sumed comedy ; he gave us the Duke Aranza, 
Octavian, Sylvester, Daggerwood, Luke, etc., and 
played Mungo, and Tom Tug ; with most ex- 
pressive power he enacted the fine tragedy, the 
Jew of Malta, and for the afterpiece sang sweetly 
Paul, exhibiting the variety and extent of his dra- 
matic capabilities without loss of his mighty fame 
as the greatest living tragedian. I attribute Kean's 
unrivalled success in so wide a range of characters 
somewhat to his extraordinary capacity for obser- 
vation. He individualized every character he as- 
sumed — we saw not Mr. Kean. Wherever he 
was, he was all eye, all ear. Every thing around 
him, or wherever he moved, fell within his cogni- 
zance. 

He might have been called the peripatetic 
philosopher. He was curious in inquiring into 
causes. He echoed the warbling of birds, the 
sounds of beasts, imitated the manner and the 
voices of numerous actors ; studied the seven ages, 
and said none but a young man could perform old 
King Lear ; was a ventriloquist, sang Tom Moore's 
Melodies with incredible sweetness, and was him- 



228 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

self the composer of several popular airs. Thus 
qualified, he drew his materials fresh from obser- 
vations amid the busy scenes of life, where he was 
ever a spectator. Garrick declared that he would 
give a hundred pounds to utter the exclamation 
'' Oh ! " as did Whitfield. What might he not 
have given to pronounce the curse on Regan as 
did Mr. Kean, or to be able to rival the pathos of 
his Othello ? 

The Lake Poets, as they were called, took a 
new road in their strides towards Parnassus, but 
that road is now mainly forsaken, and remains 
almost unvisited. Kean, with loftier aspirations 
and still more daring, essayed a new reading of 
Shakspeare ; there was large by-play, but no still 
life in him ; he rejected the monotonous and so- 
porific tone ; he left the artificial cadence and the 
cold antique to Kemble. The passions with which 
the Almighty has gifted mortals were his reliance, 
and as these will last while life's blood courses 
through the heart, so long will endure the his- 
trionic school which Kean founded. 

That Kean's first visit to the United States 
was a complete triumph none will deny ; that his 
second, after his disasters in London, by which his 
own folly and crime had made him notorious, now 
rendered the American people less charitable to 
his errors, and less cordial in their support of his 
theatrical glory, is also an admitted fact ; yet his 



EDMUND KEAN. 229 

return among us gave demonstrations enough, to 
prove that his professional merits were still recog- 
nized as of the highest order : he might have re- 
pined at the departure of those halcyon days of 
1820-21, yet there were testimonials enough 
nightly accompanying his career in 1825-26, to 
support him in his casual sinking of the spirits, 
and perhaps at times to nullify that contrition 
that weighed sa heavily at the heart. His devo- 
tion as an actor was not less earnest than when I 
first knew him. His Sir Giles in New York 
abated not of the vehemence and terror that char- 
acterized it as I had witnessed it at Old Drury in 
London, in 1816. The sarcastic parts of this 
great drama yielded the richest opportunities for 
the display of his acting powers, and of an utter- 
ance most natural as the outpouring of a con- 
summate villain. There were sometimes with him 
moments of renewed study, and he threw himself 
into several new characters which he had not pre- 
viously represented here ; his Jew of Malta, his 
Zanga, his De Montfort, and Paul, were of the 
number. His Othello was received with louder 
plaudits than ever, and his Lear, as an inspiration 
beyond mortals, was crowned with universal praises. 
Kean often told me that he considered his third 
act in Othello his most satisfactory performance 
within the range of his histrionic career. ^' Such," 
I said, " seems to be the public verdict ; yet I 



230 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

have been more held in wonder and admiration at 
your King Lear ; your discourse with Edgar con- 
centrates a body of mental philosophy." ^^ The 
real insanity and decrepitude of that old monarch, 
of fourscore and upwards/' said Kean, " is a most 
severe and laborious part. I often visited St. 
Luke's and Bethlehem hospitals in order to com- 
prehend the manifestations of real insanity ere I 
appeared in Lear. I understand you have an asy- 
lum for lunatics ; I should like to pay it a visit, 
and learn if there be any difference in the insanity 
of John Bull and of you Americans." He was 
promised an opportunity. 

A few days after, we made the desired visit at 
Bloomingdale. Kean, with an additional friend 
and myself, occupied the carriage for a sort of 
philosophical exploration of the city on our way 
thither. On the excursion he remarked he should 
like to see our Yauxhall. We stopped ; he en- 
tered the gate, asked the doorkeeper if he might 
survey the place, gave a double somerset through 
the air, and in the twinkling of an eye stood at 
the remote part of the garden. The wonder of 
the superintendent can be better imagined than 
described. Arriving at the Asylum, with suitable 
gravity he was introduced to the officials, invited 
to an inspection of the afflicted inmates, and then 
told, if he would ascend to the roof of the build- 
ing, a delightful prospect would be presented to 



EDMUND KEAN. 231 

his contemplation : many counties, and an area 
of sea, rivers, and lands, mountains and valleys, 
embracing a circuit of forty miles in circumference. 
His admiration was expressed in delicious accents. 
" I'll walk the ridge of the roof of the Asylum ! " 
he exclaimed, "and take a leap ! it's the best 
end I can make of my hfe,'' and forthwith started 
for the western gable end of the building. My 
associate and myself, as he hurried onward, seized 
him by the arms, and he submissively returned. 
I have ever been at a loss to account for this sud- 
den freak in his feelings ; he was buoyant at the 
onset of the journey ; he astonished the Yauxhall 
doorkeeper by his harlequin trick, and took an in- 
terest in the various forms of insanity which came 
before him. He might have become too sublimated 
in his feelings, or had his senses unsettled (for he 
was an electrical apparatus) in contemplating the 
mysterious influences acting on the minds of the 
deranged, for there is an attractive principle as 
well as an adhesive principle in madness ; or a 
crowd of thoughts might have oppressed him, 
arising from the disaster which had occurred to 
him a few days before with the Boston audience, 
and the irreparable loss he had sustained in the 
plunder of his trunks and valuable papers, while 
journeying hither and thither on his return to New 
York. We rejoiced together, however, when we 
found him again safely at home, at his old lodg- 



232 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

ings, at the City Hotel. I asked him in the even- 
ing how he studied the phrases of disordered intel- 
lect ; he replied, by the eye, as I control my lion. 
I cannot do better with this part of my subject 
than quote from an able article on Kean's Lear, as 
it appeared in Blackwood. Of this most genuine 
of his performances of Shakspeare, the writer says : 
" The genius of Shakspeare is the eternal rock on 
which the temple of this great actor's reputation 
must now rest ; and the ' obscene birds ' of criti- 
cism may try in vain to reach its summit and 
defile it, and the restless waves of envy and igno- 
rance may beat against its foundation unheeded, 
for their noise cannot be heard so high." 

There are a thousand stories afloat concerning 
Kean. I shall swell the number with one or two 
derived from personal knowledge. The criticisms 
of the American papers on his acting were little 
heeded by him ; he said after an actor has made 
a severe study of his character he feels himself be- 
yond the animadversions of the press. While 
here, however, a periodical was published by the 
poet Dana, called the " Idle Man.'' A number, 
in which his dramatic talents were analyzed, was 
placed in K can's hand ; having read it deliberately, 
he exclaimed, with much gratification, " This 
writer understands me ; he is a 23hilosoj)hical man ; 
I shall take his work across the water." On sev- 
eral alternate nights he played the same round of 



EDMUND KEAN. 233 

characters with the distinguished Cooper ; and 
two parties were naturally created by it. He 
soon saw that Cooper had his friends, and noticing 
the caption of the respective papers, after one or 
two successive days, he ordered his man Miller 
regularly to handle the opposition gazette with a 
pair of tongs, and convey it away from his pres- 
ence. He said he never read attacks. 

Kean had early determined to erect a monu- 
ment to the memory of the actor he most es- 
teemed, George Frederick Cooke. We waited 
upon Bishop Hobart for permission to carry out 
the design. Kean struck the attention of the 
Bishop by his penetrating eyes and his refined 
address. " You do not, gentlemen, wish the 
tablet inside St. Paul's ? " asked the bishop. 
" No, sir,'' I replied, " we desire to remove the re- 
mains of Mr. Cooke from the strangers' vault and 
erect a monument over them on some suitable spot 
in the burial-ground of the church. It will be a 
work of taste and durability." " You have my 
concurrence then," added he, " but I hardly knew 
how we could find a place inside the church for 
Mr. Cooke." The monument was finished on the 
4th of June, 1821, the day Mr. Kean terminated 
his first visit to America. He repaired in the 
afternoon to pay his last devotion to it. He 
was singularly pleased with the eulogistic lines on 
Cooke : 



234 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

" Three Kingdoms claim his birth, 
Both Hemispheres pronounce his worth." 

Tears fell from his eyes in abundance, and as the 
evening closed he walked Broadway, listened to 
the chimes of Trinity, returned again to the 
churchyard, and sang, sweeter than ever, " Those 
Evening Bells," and " Come o'er the Sea." I 
gazed upon him with more interest than had ever 
before been awaked by his stage representations. 
I fancied (and it was not altogether fancy) that I 
saw a child of genius on whom the world at large 
bestowed its loftiest praises, while he himself was 
deprived of that solace which the world cannot 
give, the sympathies of the heart. 

Towards the close of his second visit to Amer- 
ica, Kean made a tour through the northern part 
of the State, and visited Canada ; he fell in with 
the Indians, with whom he became delighted, and 
was chosen a chief of a tribe. Some time after, 
not aware of his return to the city, I received, at 
a late hour of the evening, a call to wait upon an 
Indian chief, by the name of Alantenaida, as the 
highly finished card left at my house had it. 
Kean's ordinary card was Edmund Kean, en- 
graved ; he generally wrote underneath, " Integer 
vit£e scelerisque purus." I repaired to the hotel, 
and was conducted up stairs to the folding-doors 
of the hall, when the servant left me. I entered, 
aided by the feeble light of the room ; but at the 



EDMUND KEAN. 235 

remote end I soon perceived something like a forest 
of evergreens, lighted up bv many rays from floor- 
lamps, and surrounding a stage or throne ; and 
seated in great state was the chief. I advanced, 
and a more terrific warrior I never surveyed. Eed 
Jacket or Black Hawk was an unadorned, simple 
personage in comparison. Full dressed, with skins 
tagged loosely about his person, a broad collar of 
bear-skin over his shoulders, his leggings, with 
many stripes, garnished with porcupine quills ; his 
moccasons decorated with beads ; his head decked 
with the war-eagle's plumes, behind which flowed 
massive black locks of dishevelled horse-hair ; 
golden-colored rings pendant from the nose and 
ears ; streaks of yellow paint over the face, massive 
red daubings about the eyes, with various hues in 
streaks across the forehead, not very artistically 
drawn. A broad belt surrounded his waist, with 
tomahawk ; his arms, with shining bracelets, 
stretched out with bow and arrow, as if ready for 
a mark. He descended his throne and rapidly 
approached me. His eye was meteoric and fear- 
ful, like the furnace of the cyclops. He vocifer- 
ously exclaimed, Alantenaida ! the vowels strong 
enough. I was relieved ; he betrayed something 
of his raucous voice in imprecation. It was Kean. 
An explanation took place. He wished to know 
the merits of the representation. The Hurons 
had honored him by admission into their tribe, 



236 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

and he could not now determine whetlier to seek 
his final earthly abode with them for real happi- 
ness, or return to London, and add renown to his 
name by performing the Son of the Forest. I 
never heard that he ever afterwards attempted, in 
his own country, the character. He was wrought 
up to the highest pitch of enthusiasm at the In- 
dian honor he had received, and declared that even 
Old Drury had never conferred so proud a distinc- 
tion on him as he had received from the Hurons. 
My visit was of some time. After pacing the 
room, with Indian step, for an hour or more, and 
contemplating himself before a large mirror, he 
was prevailed upon to change his dress and retire 
to rest. A day or two after, he sailed for Europe, 
with his Indian paraphernalia.* 

* The professional receipts of Kean during his engagement in 
New York, were, I believe, at least, equal to those for a like num- 
ber of nights which he received at the acme of his renown in 
London. His average income for some twelve or fifteen years 
was not less than ten thousand pounds per annum. He rescued 
Old Drury from bankruptcy, yet he is said to have been often in 
need, and died almost penniless. There was no one special ex- 
travagance chargeable to him ; but he was reckless in money mat- 
ters, and figures entered not into his calculations. He had a help- 
ing hand for all applications, and he never forgot his early friends. 
As in the case of Quin, the needy found in him a benefactor. The 
noble conduct of his son Charles is familiarly known, and his at- 
tention in giving greater protection to his father's monument of 
Cooke in St. Paul's churchyard, is proof sufficient of his generous 
qualities ; but no language can plead in extenuation of the de- 
plorable prodigality of the elder Kean. 



EDMUND KEAN. 237 

I have said nothing of the intemperate habits, 
or of the extravagance and profuse liberality of 
Kean. That word intemperate is to be viewed in 
various lights, and with much qualification. The 
old proverb, that what is one man's food is an- 
other's poison, has much of fact in it. Viewing, 
moreover, intemperance as among the greatest ca- 
lamities that afflict mortals, I should sadden in 
my soul if a word proceeded from my lips that 
might give it any quarters. But Mr. Kean's sus- 
ceptibilities to impression were such that high ex- 
citement might follow two or three glasses of port. 
Mr. Grattan has well described the progress of 
that condition in Kean, and I have observed, at 
several times, that those Latin citations of his 
were ominous. Yet I never saw Mr. Kean indulge 
in any drink whatever, until the labors of the 
drama were over. That he often at other times 
erred, I am ready to admit. Knox, an English 
actor, who played Glenalvon, demanded two quarts 
of brandy to go through with that character in his 
stentorian way, and when I administered reproof 
to him, because of his inordinate indulgence, he 
only replied it was just the right measure. John 
Reeve, according to manager Simpson, partook 
still more bountifully to carry through his broad 
farce ; but he was very bulky, and required almost 
a kilderkin to saturate him. The benevolence of 
Kean, and his charities, were almost proverbs. 



238 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Another noble attribute characterized him : he 
was free of professional envy, and lauded rising 
merit. AU he asked was to be announced to the 
public in large letters. He prognosticated the 
career of Forest, after seeing his Othello once. I 
could not dismiss Kean with more brevity. He 
was a meteor in the dramatic firmament. I might 
have added much more. The classical Tucker- 
man, in his Biographical Essays, has given us an 
admirable exposition of the philosophy of the man 
and his acting, and Proctor has done weU with 
him, but might have done better. I shall say less 
of Mathews and Macready. 

Hemmed in as I am by time and circum- 
stances, I am compelled to restrict my observations 
on Charles Mathews, a man of extraordinary facul^ 
ties, who had secured a prodigious renown in his 
vocation ere his arrival in the American States, 
and which reputation was increased by his public 
displays in this country. He was a remarkable 
specimen of what early training and study may 
accomplish. His very physical defects yielded to 
him special advantages. His close observation, 
his susceptible nervous system, his half hypochon- 
driacal temperament, sharpened a natural acute- 
ness, which, with uninterrupted devotion, led to 
results of the most commanding regard. If ever 
triumph was secured by speciality, it was eminently 
so in the case of Mathews. He studied occur- 



CHARLES MATHEWS. 239 

rences with the severity of philosopliical analysis. 
Attitudes, the lear of the eye, the motion of the 
lip, the crook of the fingers, the turn of the toe, 
the ringlet of a lock, intonation of voice, every 
demonstration of emotion or passion, came within 
the scope of his capabilities. The characteristics 
of divers nations marking every condition of varied 
life, from the dignity of the Plenipo to the ser- 
vitude of the menial, were all caught by him, and 
you looked in turn to him for the verisimilitude of 
every dehneation he attempted. The brooding 
cadence of the cooing dove, and the hideous bray- 
ing of the donkey, were equally at the command 
of his versatile talents. He was, in short, the 
master of mimic power, and used it with unpar- 
alleled effect. In comedy he was the acknowl- 
edged head in numerous parts. His Groldfinch is 
represented to me, by experienced theatrical goers, 
to have surpassed that of Hodgkinson ; his Lord 
Ogilby, his Morbleau, his Monsieur Mallet, his 
Coddle, and many other portraitures, still remain 
in vivid recollection. His " At Home " proved 
him, indeed, the actor of all work, and with the 
American community, jdelding to the persuasions 
of friends, he evinced the extraordinary capacity 
that Othello could be enacted by him with signal 
success. 

If it be asked how came Mathews the posses- 
sor of such rare gifts, I answer, they were derived 



240 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

from a nervous susceptibility of the most impres- 
sible order, from intense study, and the cultiva- 
tion of elegant literature. He read largely ; he 
was quickened into observation by every phase of 
varied life, and his morbid constitution never for- 
sook him, or tolerated indifference to surrounding- 
objects. Like an homeopathic patient, he was 
never well — always complaining, and ever on the 
look-out, with this difference, however, that while 
the narcotized victim seems incessantly in search 
of physical improvement, Mathews seemed ever to 
be busy in intellectual progress. With the dex- 
terity of an archer he aimed at characteristics 
wherever they might be found, and made the pe- 
culiarities of individuals the pledge of his skill. 
Abroad he sought out John Philpot Curran, and 
embodied, both the manner and thoughts of the 
orator most faithfully. In this country he looked 
out for the great Irish orator, Thomas Addis Em- 
met, and unconsciously, to the great pleader, took 
him to the life, in manner and in tone, with tran- 
scendent effect. Had that jurist lived in these 
latter days, with spiritualism and clairvoyance 
running mad, he might have concluded himself 
to have been translated into some other individu- 
ahty. 

Mathews' arrival in New York occurred in Sep- 
tember, 1822 ; the yellow fever was prevailing. I 
received a kind note from that benevolent man, 



CHARLES MATHEWS. 241 

Simpson, the manager of the Park Theatre, to 
hasten on hoard a ship off the harbor, in which 
was Mr. Mathews, in mental distress at the pros- 
pect of landing. The phenomena exhibited by 
his nervous temperament were most striking : he 
had been informed that one hundred and forty 
deaths had occurred on that day. Though some 
three miles off the Battery, he felt, he affirmed, 
the pestilential air of the city ; every cloud came 
to him surcharged with mortality ; every wave 
imparted from the deep exhalations of destruc- 
tion. He walked the deck, tottering, and in the 
extremest agitation. He refused to land at the 
city, and insisted upon finding shelter in some re- 
mote place. Hoboken was decided upon, and 
thither Mr. Simpson and myself accompanied 
him. Some two miles from the Jersey shore, on 
the road towards Hackensack, Mr. Simpson found 
lodgings for him in a rural retreat occupied by a 
gardener. Here Mathews passed the night walk- 
ing to and fro in his limited apartment, ruminat- 
ing on his probable departure within a few hours 
to the world of spirits. Hoboken, as it afforded 
him safety, as time proved, in his extreme distress, 
afterwards became his favorite spot for repose dur- 
ing his professional toil, and very often, after his 
theatrical duties were discharged, he was conveyed 
at midnight hour to that then beautiful locality. 
Not a few of the suggestions which crossed his 
11 



242 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

mind in contemplating tlie American or Yankee 
character, were here elaborated for liis future 
graphic sketches in dramatic delineation. 

This great comedian was well stored with knowl- 
edge, and cherished a heartfelt love for literary char- 
acters ; his visit to Edinburgh, and his acquaintance 
with Sir Walter Scott, Terry, and other eminent 
men of the stage, authors, and actors, and the social 
circle in domestic society, in which he held a part, 
led him to a high appreciation of intellectual pur- 
suits. Our Cooper, our Irving, Halleck and Dun- 
lap, were among his- favorite friends. With Dr. 
Hosack and the generous Philip Hone, he enjoyed 
many festive hours. Mathews was the first indi- 
vidual, I heard, who gave a pretty decisive opin- 
ion that Scott was the author of the Waverley 
novels ; this was five years before the disclosure of 
the fact, by Sir Walter himself, at the Ballantyne 
dinner, and while we in New York were digesting 
the argument of Coleman, of the Evening Post, 
and his correspondents, who attempted to prove 
that such could not be the truth, and that a Ma- 
jor or Col. Scott, of Canada, was the actual au- 
thor. The adhesion to this belief was, I believe, 
never broken up in the mind of Coleman. But 
this pertinacity was very characteristic, for what 
could you do with a man who contended through 
life that Bonaparte was no soldier ; that Priestley 
had done the world infinitely more harm than 



WILLIAM C. MACREADY. 243 

good ; that skullcap was a certain specific for the 
cure of hydrophobia, and that yellow fever was as 
contagious as the plague of Aleppo ? And he 
held many for a while in his belief, for Coleman 
was pronounced by his advocates a field marshal 
in literature, as well as in politics. There was 
much of worldly prudence in the habits and de- 
meanor of Charles Mathews, and he who would 
comprehend the labors, self-denials, and toils of 
the successful competitor for histrionic distinction, 
might profitably study the Hfe of this renowned 
actor. He was the apostle of temperance and 
circumspection. 

Macready, having secured a provincial reputa- 
tion, appeared on the London boards at that par- 
ticular juncture in histrionic affairs when Kemble, 
Mrs. Siddons, and Young had left the stage, or 
were about to withdraw from the sphere of their 
labors, and when Miss O'Neil was on the eve of 
closing her brilliant and most successful career. 
His first appearance in the metropolis was in the 
character of Orestes, in the Distressed Mother. 
His reception was all that could be desired, and 
Kean, with his wonted liberality, applauded his 
talents. He soon assumed the Shakspearian char- 
acters, and his Coriolanus, Richard the Third, 
Macbeth, and his lago, added vastly to his re- 
nown. The world, however, cannot always be de- 
voted to Shakspeare ; novelty is sought, and 



244 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Macready presented a captivating example of it 
in his Kob Roy. He became the original repre- 
sentative of several of Sheridan Knowles' heroes, 
and his Cains Gracchus and "William Tell gave 
still greater scope to his commanding powers. In 
1826 he visited New York, and won the homage 
of the severest critics, by his personation of the 
master characters of Shakspeare, which he had 
enacted in London. Upon his return to the 
United States in 1849, he still further swelled the 
tide of public approbation by his King Lear, Wil- 
liam Tell, and his Richelieu. The disasters which 
disgraced our metropolis, by the occurrence of the 
Astor Opera House riot, are still fresh in memory, 
and need not be dwelt upon. On that memorable 
occasion, Macready gave proofs abundant of his 
personal prowess and undaunted spirit. Mr. 
Macready has made three visits to the United 
States — in 1826, 1844, and 1849 — and has been 
received at each visitation with an increased pub- 
lic approbation. 

To analyze the wide range of the drama which 
the professional life of Macready embraced, would 
be presumptuous, and is not within our power ; we 
are, moreover, merely touching some of the leading 
incidents in the histrionic movements of this city, 
and are exempt from the obligations which an ad- 
dress to the Dramatic Association might impose. 
Mr. Macready is less of a comedian than tragedian, 



WILLIAM C. MACREADY. 245 

but in this latter, the materials are ample to de- 
monstrate that, in the maturity of his faculties, 
his efficiency justly placed him at the head of the 
English stage. He cannot be entirely classed with 
the exclusive followers of nature, though he bor- 
rowed largely from her resources ; and it would be 
unjust to his original powers to attribute his ex- 
cellences to his adoption of the cold and formal 
school of actors. Hazlitt, a discriminating dra- 
matic critic, pronounced him by far the best tragic 
actor that had come out, with the exception of 
Kean. But Mr. Macready has other and higher 
claims to our regard and esteem. He studied and 
enacted Shakspeare less for objects of pecuniary 
result than to bring out for increased admiration 
the matchless beauties and the deep philosophy of 
the great author in the purity of his own incom- 
parable diction ; and he made corresponding efforts 
to eradicate the corruptions which annotators and 
playwrights have introduced. He loathed the 
clap-traps of sentiment with which the stage was 
so often burthened. He was restless with the 
commentators. The bloated reputation of Gibber's 
interpolations he decried, and felt anguish at the 
innovations of even Dryden and Massinger. They 
were obstacles to the true worship of Shakspeare, 
and he deemed it imperative that they be over- 
come. We should hold no parley, he said, with 
critics who could pilfer an absurdity, and then pro- 



246 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

fanely saddle it on Shakspeare. Assuredly he de- 
serves all praise for his unceasing toil and his noble 
ambition. 

Mr. Macready has been ever scrupulously 
careful about assuming a part in plays which 
tended to the exaltation of the baser passions, 
and the increase of licentiousness. The regularity 
of his own hfe added to the self-gratification he 
enjoyed from so scrupulous a line of conduct in his 
professional duty. Believing that a great ethical 
principle for the improvement of morals and the 
diffusion of knowledge resided in the stage, he, 
above all things, wished Shakspeare to be exhibited 
as he is, unencumbered with the trappings of other 
minds, and I have httle doubt that in his happy 
retirement he finds solace in the conduct he 
adopted. Elegant letters occupy a portion of the 
leisure hours which Mr. Macready has at command 
since his withdrawal from theatrical toil, and the 
journals have recently noticed with commendation 
the efforts he is engaged in to enlarge the empire 
of thought and morals by promoting the estab- 
lishment of public schools. He virtually, if recent 
reports be true, is at this present period a volun- 
tary teacher of morals and science. His philan- 
thropy has created a school for the rising gen- 
eration, and even for maturer years, at his beautiful 
retreat, at Sherborne, in Dorsetshire. Whatever 
may have been the vicissitudes and trials which 



WILLIAM C. MACREADY. 247 

have oppressed at times the course of his honorable 
life, he will assuredly find an adequate recompense 
in the benevolent and grateful pursuits which now 
absorb so largely his experienced intellect. His 
late lecture on poetry, and its influence on popular 
education, delivered before the British Athenaeum, 
has been read by thousands with the strongest ap- 
proval 

To these fragmentary observations on the drama 
and the players, I shall add a quotation from a 
judicious criticism on the edition of Shakspeare 
lately published, with numerous annotations, by 
the Rev. H. N. Hudson. F.ew will dissent from 
the closing remarks of the able writer. Mr. Gould 
observes : " We cannot forbear a passing remark 
on the disappearance of the theatrical represen- 
tatives of Shakspeare, just at the point of time 
when his text, in its highest attainable purity, is 
restored to the world. Garrick, Kemble, Siddons, 
Cooke, Kean, and Macready, for the greater part 
of a century, practically expounded the language 
of the poet ; and the genius of the actor, co- 
operating with the genius of the author, unfolded 
to five successive generations the li\ing reahties of 
Shakspeare's power. These six luminaries have 
now all passed away ; Macready alone surviving 
to enjoy in retirement the homage due to his pub- 
lic talents and private virtues. The loss of these 
great actors is the more to be deplored, because 



248 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

their art dies with tliem, and hence it is not 
strange that, with their professional exit, the 
drama itself should have declined. Shakspeare is 
immortal in the library ; but on the stage probably 
few men now living will see him resuscitated."" 

To this brief but impartial narrative of the his- 
trionic art among us, I can add but little more at 
present. The past twenty or thirty years are indeed 
full of dramatic incident, and demand an ample 
page for illustration. Some one doubtless will ap- 
pear in due season to record its triumphs and its 
defeats. Conway might justify some few lines ; 
a man of acknowledged powers, of high asj)ira- 
tions, and of close study, whose tuition in the 
once popular school of Kemble failed as a 
passport to entire success. Something more he 
found was wanting, and laboring in the complex- 
ities of various readings and orthoepy, his ner- 
vous temperament yielded to the mortification of 
defeat : finding himself undervalued, melancholy 
marked him as her own, and a fixed reserve and 
seclusion characterized his entire demeanor. His 
sensitive nature finally led him to self-destruction, 
by drowning himself in his passage by sea for 
Charleston. That remarkable woman in literary 
history, Mrs. Piozzi, in her eightieth year had 
addressed to him many letters touching affairs of 
the heart, which the sense of Conway must have 
deemed the offspring of dotage ; but after his 



COOPER. CLASON. 249 

death an inquisitive public brought them to light. 
Conway was beyond the reach of medical skill 
when I became acquainted with him. 

The career of Cooper, long signalized by suc- 
cess, would constitute a chapter in diversified life 
richly instractive. His laurels were withered by 
Cooke, but he achieved new honors in William 
Tell, Yirginius, and other parts. Wood, in his 
interesting Eecollections of the Stage, quotes the 
approbation bestowed on Cooper by Roscoe, the 
historian of Leo X. Cooper was an incessant reader 
of Schlegel, who, he said, was the only worthy 
commentator on Shakspeare. Booth, an eccentric, 
reckless, and unreliable man, who assumed a 
rivalship with the elder Kean, might be noted for 
his extravagant displays of dramatic power, and 
his final failure. He lacked judgment, he pos- 
sessed genius. He, nevertheless, was held in ad- 
miration by many of the friends of the drama. 
Brief and imperfect as these sketches of the stage 
are, I cannot omit a record of the appearance of 
Clason on the New York boards in 1824. He 
enacted Zanga and Hamlet with artistic skill, ripe 
judgment, and efi'ect. He early was drawn into a 
fondness for elegant literature ; he read history 
profoundly ; studied rhetoric, and had given in- 
struction in the art of reading with great appro- 
bation. His genius was manifested in an eminent 
degree by his publication of two cantos of Don 
11* 



250 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Juan, the I7th and 18tli, as a continuation by- 
Lord Byron. In England he formed an acquaint- 
ance with Dibdin, the celebrated song writer, and 
for a while wrote for the periodical journals ; and 
having exhausted fortune and friends, terminated 
life by suffocation from charcoal, in 1830, at the 
age of about thirty- two years. " His fate," says 
Dr. Grriswold, "is an unfavorable commentary on 
his character." We may more wonder that so 
great a libertine lived so long, than that so incon- 
siderate a man died so soon. 

Other names of equal consideration might find 
a place in the modern history of theatrical affairs 
in New York. Philips and Incledon, in the melo- 
dramatic line ; Tyrone Power, the attractive co- 
median ; Home, the vocalist. Excessive mobility 
of the nervous system characterized all these dis- 
ciples of the musical world. The first of them is 
best remembered by his falsetto and his Eveleen's 
Bower ; Incledon, by the uncommon powers of his 
voice, his energetic and harmonious strains ; the 
ballad was his forte, and his Black-eyed Susan 
and the Storm, the proofs of his mastery in melo- 
dy ; his part in the " Quaker'' was liis best acting. 
Power excelled in the Irish character, as did his 
great predecessor Johnstone ; he introduced the 
richest brogue, and was the soul of vivacity. The 
direful disaster, his loss in the steamship President, 
is still fresh in memory. Horn first evinced his 



CHARLES E. HORN. 251 

musical talent in New York, in the cliaracter of 
Caspar in Der Freiscliutz ; lie was a composer as 
well as a performer, and much of the popular song 
music of the past twenty years was of his coinage. 

At the stated meeting of the venerable Society 
of Cincinnati, held 4th of July, 1842, at which 
Gen. Morgan Lewis, as President, officiated, then 
in the eighty-seventh year of his age, with Major 
Popham, soon after his successor in office, and 
several other revolutionary worthies, Horn was an 
invited guest. Like all other musical men whom 
I have known, and who have seen much of the 
world, I found him courteous, refined, and of agree- 
able address. He told us of the vast sums several 
of his musical compositions had brought him, 
sang several of his own melodies, and two or three 
of our continental ballads, concerning Gage and 
Cornwallis, to the delight of the old patriots. 
Horn died in Boston, a few years after, of j)ul- 
monary disorder. 

For a series of years the manager of our Park 
Theatre, Price, strove hard by liberal pecuniary 
proffers to secure the appearance of John Kemble 
and Mrs. Siddons on our boards. The insuperable 
difficulty was the dread of an Atlantic voyage. 
It would appear these renowned performers could 
never overcome their apprehensions of danger from 
such an undertaking. Price often regretted the 
disappointment, and he had friends enough to 



252 HISTOEICAL DISCOURSE. 

unite in sympatliy with him. Yet after the lapse 
of a generation the gratifying intelligence was an- 
nounced that Charles Kemhle and his accom- 
plished daughter, Miss Fanny Kemble, had reached 
our shores. This was in 1831. The rej)utation 
of the father had long been estahhshed ; his comic 
and his tragic abilities were matters of record in 
dramatic annals ; his Charles Surface, his Mirabel, 
his Edgar, his Pierre, and his Falconbridge, were 
the parts that won him his biightest laurels ; and 
his other achievements were crowned by his Ham- 
let. His daughter, Fanny, enlisted the warmest 
plaudits, and soon increased admiration by every 
new display of histrionic talent. She assumed 
tragic and comic parts, and demonstrated that she 
was fairly entitled to her hereditary honors. 

Dismissing further remarks on this gifted lady's 
stage-acting, I shall add a few words on her read- 
ings. As the last representative of this remark- 
able family now among us, Mrs. Kemble, since her 
retirement from the stage, has again and again 
delighted intellectual audiences in our principal 
cities by Shakspearian readings. She possesses in 
an eminent degree the physical superiority and the 
mental force of her kindred. Her voice is of great 
compass, singularly flexible, and capable of every 
tone of emotional significance ; we have the ring- 
ino; lauo'h of Beatrice, when Benedick ofters him- 
self, and the heart-rending cry of Macduff, " he 



FANNY KEMBLE. 253 

has no children ; " the change of her voice is almost 
ventriloquism. She possesses a rare sympathetic 
intelligence whereby she is able to illustrate the 
feeling and the sentiment of Shakspeare, and the 
secret of her wondrous elocutionary success is ap- 
parent. She adapts her voice, expression of coun- 
tenance, gesture and manner, to the respective 
parts in each drama, and this with an artistic skill 
and earnest feeHng which charm the auditor. 
She comprehends the true depths of inspiration, 
feels what she acts and acts what she feels ; now 
the gentle, innocent Olivia, now the dissimulating 
fiend Lady Macbeth ; when listening you forget 
that one, is reading, you see and hear all ; so sud- 
den is her transition in dialogue — so rapid the 
change of every expression. Night after night to 
crowded audiences, she thus gave us the highest 
pleasure without the artificial illusions of the stage 
in its palmy days. In comic dialogue and in im- 
passioned sohloquy she seems inspired, and revives 
the richest memories of those histrionic triumphs 
which have made for ever celebrated the naraes of 
her illustrious aunt and classic father. 

Were my individual feelings to be consulted, I 
would fain dwell at some length on the introduc- 
tion of the Garcia Italian opera troujpe in this city 
as an historical occurrence in intellectual progress 
of permanent interest. It was destined to create 
new feelings, to awaken new sentiments in the cir- 



254 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

cle of refined and social life, and its mission I 
believe is accomplished. The ojoera, whatever may- 
be the disputes touching its origin, was known to 
be the offspring of genius. It had universal ap- 
proval as an exalted mental recreation to recom- 
mend it ; its novelty here secured prompt atten- 
tion to its claims, and its troupe of artists who 
honored us with their entree were considered the 
recognized professors of the highest order in the 
art. It captivated the eye, it charmed the ear, it 
awakened the profoundest emotions of the heart. 
It j)aralyzed all further eulogiums on the casual 
song-singing heretofore interspersed in the English 
comedy, and rendered the popular airs of the drama, 
which had possession of the feelings, the lifeless 
materials of childish ignorance. Something, per- 
haps, was to be ascribed to fashionable emotion, 
for this immediate popular ascendency. For this 
advantageous accession to the resources of mental 
gratification, we were indebted to the taste and 
refinement of Dominick Lynch, the liberality of 
the manager of the Park Theatre, Stephen Price, 
and the distinguished reputation of the Venetian, 
Lorenzo Da Ponte. Lynch, a native of New York, 
was the acknowledged head of the fashionable and 
festive board, a gentleman of the ton, and a melo- 
dist of great powers and of exquisite taste ; he 
had long striven to enhance the character of our 
music ; he was the master of English song, but he 



ITALIAN OPERA. 255 

feltj from his close cultivation of nmsic and his 
knowledge of the genius of his countrymen, that 
much was wanting, and that more could be accom- 
l^lished, and he sought out, while in Europe, an 
Italian troupe, w^hich his persuasive eloquence and 
the liberal spirit of Price led to embark for our 
shores, where they arrived in November, 1825. 
The old Italian poet and composer of the libretto 
of Don Giovanni and Le Nozze di Figaro, the as- 
sociate of Mozart, was here in this city to greet 
them, and on the night of 29th of October, 1825, 
at the Park Theatre, w^e listened to II Barbiere de 
Seviglie of the matchless Kossini. 

More was realized by the immense multitude 
who filled the house than had been anticij^ated, 
and the opera ended with an universal shout of 
bravo, hravissimo. The city reverberated the ac- 
clamations. The indomitable energy of Garcia, 
aided by his melodious strains and his exhaustless 
powers, the bewitching talents of his daughter, 
the Signorina Garcia, with her artistic faculties as 
an actress, and her flights of inspirations, the 
novelty of her conception, and her captivating 
person, proved that a galaxy of genius in a novel 
vocation unknown to the New World, demanded 
now its patronage. To these primary personages, 
as making up the roll, were added Angrisani, 
whose bass seemed as the peal of the noted organ 
at Haerlem ; Rosich, a buffo of great resources ; 



256 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Crevelli, a promising debutante ; the younger 
Garcia, with Signora Garcia, and Madame Bar- 
biere with her capacious tenor, constituting a mu- 
sical phalanx which neither London nor Paris 
could surpass, nay, at that time could not equal. 
From the moment that first night's entertainment 
closed, I looked upon the songs of Phillips (which 
had made Coleman, the editor, music-mad), the 
melodies of Moore, and even the ballads of Scot- 
land, as shorn of their popularity, and even now I 
think myself not much in error in holding to the 
same opinion, fhe Italian opera is an elaboration 
of many thoughts, of intelligence extensive and 
various ; w^hile it assimilates itself by its harmo- 
nious construction and entirety, it becomes effec- 
tive by external impression and rational com- 
bination. It blends instruction with delight ; if it 
does not make heroes, it at least leads captive the 
noblest attributes of humanity ; and had a larger 
forethought and wiser government watched over 
its destinies, it might still exist in its attractive 
displays as a pennanent institution in this en- 
lightened and liberal metropolis. 

I must add a few words on that great Maestro, 
Garcia. It is true that his vast reputation is secured 
for the future by his biographer ; he was a suc- 
cessful teacher, a composer of many operas, and 
his merits as a performer are fresh in the recollec- 
tions of the operatic world ; but it is sometimes 



SIGNOR GARCIA. 257 

profitable to cast a backward glance over what we 
have lost. He was a native of Seville, reared in 
Spanish music, and in fulfilling his j)art in that 
role with enthusiasm, was summoned in 1809 to 
Paris, where he was the first Spanish musician 
that' appeared in that caj)ital. Garat, on hearing 
him, exclaimed, " The Andalusian purity of the 
man makes me all alive." Prince Murat chose 
him as first tenor of his own chapel in 1812, at 
Naples. Catalini obtained him for her first tenor, 
1816, in Paris. Here Eossini saw him, and ar- 
ranged affairs so that he appeared in the Barber 
of Seville, of which he was the original represent- 
ative. He visited England in 1817, where his 
wonderful powers were still higher extolled, from 
his Othello and his Don Juan. In Paris our New 
York friend Lynch found him, and proffered in- 
ducements for him to visit America. Here his 
combined qualities as singer and actor, have never 
been equalled ; his Othello, for force, just discrimi- 
nation, and expression, astounding the beholder, 
and filling the house with raptures. His career 
in Mexico followed ; and sad to relate, while on 
his return to Vera Cruz, he was beset by ban- 
ditti, stripped of his clothing, and plundered of 
his 1000 oz. of gold (about $17,000 of our money), 
the results of his severe earnings : penniless he 
finally reached Paris, to resume his professional 
labors. His spirits failed him not, but his musical 



258 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

powers were on tlie wane, and being the first to 
detect the decline of his great talents, and too 
honest to pass a counterfeit note, he left the 
operatic boards and died in 1836, aged fifty-eight. 
From the sixth year of his age, and through 
life, Garcia was the arbiter of his own fortunes. 
He may be pronounced the restorer of Mozart and 
the promulgator of Eossini's matchless works. His 
daughter, afterwards Madame Malibran, eclipsed 
even the talents of her father ; and her abilities 
are still a popular topic of conversation. She had 
the rare gift of possessing the contralto and the 
soprano. Her ardor, both as actress and as singer, 
exhibited almost a frantic enthusiasm. Animated 
by the lofty consciousness of genius, the novelty 
of her conceptions, her vivid j^ictures, her inex- 
haustible spirits, had never been equalled by any 
predecessor in her calling. She had no Farinelli for 
an instructor, but the tremendous energy, not to 
say severity of her father, brought out the facul- 
ties of her voice to the wonder of all who heard 
her. She may be said to have been consumed by 
the fire of her own genius. Her " Una Voce " 
and other airs reached the highest point of instru- 
mentation, according to the opinion of the most 
astute judges. She has been followed by no imi- 
tator, because none could approach her. Eecently 
with Alboni and Jenny Lind we have had a par- 
tial echo of her. Perhaps her ravishing person 



SIGNORA GARCIA. 259 

served to swell the tide of public approbation of 
her ravishing voice. She enchained eyes and ears. 
Her earlier (not her earliest) efforts were first ap- 
preciated at the Park Theatre, and the predictions 
there uttered of her ultimate victories, were fully 
verified on her return to England. So far Ameri- 
can appreciation did honor to the then state of 
musical culture with the New Yorkers. 

In my medical capacity I became well ac- 
quainted with the Garcia troupe ; they possessed 
good constitutions and took little physic ; but 
what I would aim at in the few remarks I have 
yet to make is, to show that those who are not ar- 
tists little know the toil demanded for eminent 
success in the musical world. Some twelve or -six- 
teen hours' daily labor may secure a medical man 
from want in this city of great exj^enses and 
moderate fees ; more than that time may earnestly 
be devoted for many years to secure the fame of a 
great opera singer. It seemed to me that the 
troupe were never idle. They had not crossed the 
Atlantic twenty-four hours ere they were at their 
notes and their instruments, and when we add 
their public labors at the theatre, more than half 
of the twenty-four hours was consumed in their 
pursuit. A President of the United States or a 
Lord Chancellor methinks might be easier reared 
than a Malibran. I dismiss all allusion to nature's 
gifts and peculiar aptitudes. It is assumed that 



260 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

brains are demanded in all intellectual business 
The simplicity of life, and the prescribed tem- 
perance of these musical people, was another 
lesson taught me. How many things are attended 
to lest the voice may suffer. A taste of claret, a 
glass of lemonade, eau sucree, were all the drinks 
tolerated, and scarcely a p)article of animal food 
until the opera was over, when, at midnight, a 
comfortable supper refreshed their exhausted 
spirits and gave repose to their limbs. The youth 
who aims at distinction in physic, in law, or in 
divinity, and who is at all cursed with indolence, 
might profit by studying the lives of these masters 
in song, as the naturalist philosoj)hizes with the 
habits of the bee. 

Many of this assembly, and particularly the 
ladies who now grace this audience, must well re- 
member their old teacher, Signer Lorenzo Da 
Ponte, so long a j)rofessor of Italian literature in 
Columbia College, the stately nonogenarian whose 
white locks so richly ornamented his ck-ssical front 
and his graceful and elegant person. He falls 
within the compass of this imperfect address from 
his " lonely conspicuity," for the taste he cherished, 
and the industry he displayed in the cultivation 
of Italian letters ; more than two thousand scho- 
lars having been initiated in the language of Italy 
by him, and he is still more intervoven with our 
theme by his enthusiastic efforts to establish the 



LORENZO DA PONTE. 261 

Italian opera with us. He was upwards of sixty 
years of age upon his arrival in America, but en- 
joyed sturdy manhood. His credentials to con- 
sideration challenged the esteem of the philosopher, 
the poet, and the man of letters. His long and 
eventful life deserves an ample record. His own 
Memoirs in part supply our wants, and the sketch 
of his life by one of the members of our Historical 
Society, Samuel Ward, is a grateful tribute to his 
character, from the pen of an accomplished scholar 
and competent judge of his peculiar merits. I 
enjoyed the acquaintance of Da Ponte some twenty 
years. Kelly, in his reminiscences, has given us 
some idea of his early personal appearance and his 
fanciful costume at the London opera. But his 
glory and inward consolation had not been attained 
until the Garcia troupe triumphed at New York, 
as erst at Vienna, in Don Giovanni. The lan- 
guage of Italy and her music were deeply-rooted 
in his heart. 

A fair estimate inay be formed of the great 
extent and variety of Da Ponte's knowledge, of 
his deep devotion to the mental capacity of Italy, 
his adoration of her language, and his laudations 
of her mighty authors ; the strength, the copious- 
ness and the sweetness of her language, and the 
fertility and special excellence of her divine music, 
by, a perusal of his elaborate pamphlet which he 
published in N-nv York in 1821, entitled SuW 



'162 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Italia. Discorso Ajjologetico in risposfa alia let- 
tera delV advocato Carlo Phillips. I was of the 
audience when Da Ponte delivered this Discourse 
in English before a large assemblage, with all the 
earnestness and animation of a great speaker. The 
work itself took its origin from the asj)ersions cast 
u]3on the Italian character by the British press, at 
the time when the English papers were filled with 
the details of the alleged corrupt conduct of Caro- 
line, the queen consort of George the Fourth, and 
of the Italian witnesses. The copious stores of 
Da Ponte's reading can be estimated by a perusal 
of this vindication of his country and his country- 
men. In reference to his native tongue he thus 
speaks : " With her good fortune, Italy for five 
hundred years has preserved her charming lan- 
guage. That language which, from its united 
sweetness, delicacy, force, and richness, compares 
with every ancient language, and surpasses every 
modern tongue ; which equals in sublimity the 
Greek, the Latin in magnificence, in grandeur and 
conciseness the Hebrew, the German in boldness, 
in majesty the Spanish, and the English in energy. 
That language in fine, which Providence bestowed 
on the Itahans, because so perfectly adapted in its 
almost supernatural harmoniousness to the deli- 
cacy of their organs and perceptions, to the 
vivacity of their minds, and to the complexion of 
their ideas and sentiments, and which was formed 



LORENZO DA PONTE. 263 

SO justly to illustrate tlieir character." Tliis 
pamplilet by Da Ponte is well worth an attentive 
perusal at the present daVj and is not to be classed 
among ephemeral productions. 

It was a day of lofty thought for the old pa- 
triarch, says his American biographer, when came 
among us Garcia with his lovely daughter, then in 
the morning of her renown ; Rosich, the inimi- 
table buftb ; Angrisani with ' his tomb note, and 
Madame Barbiere, all led by our lamented Alma- 
viva.* I must refer to the able articles on the 
introduction of the opera, written by a philosoph- 
ical critic in the New York Ee\dew and Athe- 
neum Magazine for December, 1825. They con- 
stitute a record of the social progress of this city 
that cannot be overlooked. Da Ponte died in 
New York in August, 1838, at ninety years. His 
remains were followed to the grave by many of our 
most distino-uished citizens, amono- whom were the 
venerable Clement C. Moore, the Hon. G. C. Yer- 
planck, Pietro Maroncelh, the fellow-prisoner of 
Sylvio Pellico, and his physician, &c. That his 
lonoj life created no wastinor infirmitv of mind, was 
shown in a striking manner by his publication of 
a portion of the poet Hillhouse's Hadad, not long 
before his final illness, and which he beautifully 
rendered in Italian with scholastic fidelity. The 

* Dominick Lynch, Esq. 



264 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

day before Lis death he honored me with a series 
of verses in his native tongue, partly I concluded, 
in token of gratitude, and partly to evince to his 
friends, that though speech, had nigh left him his 
mind was still entire. He died firm in the Catho- 
lic faith, and was buried in the Eoman Catholic 
cemetery. Second Avenue. 

Mr. Ward, his American biographer, in his 
sketch has thus pictorially described the last 
hours of the venerable Da Ponte. " The closing 
thirty yeai^ of an existence, so rife with incident 
and adventure, terminated in this city at nine 
o'clock on Friday evening, the seventeenth day of 
August, 1838, just three months after the decease 
of Prince Talleyrand, whom he preceded five years 
upon the stage of life. Like that illustrious states- 
man, he died in the Catholic faith, of which he 
had for some time past been a zealous promoter. 

" Two days previous to this event his sick 
chamber presented an interesting spectacle. Doc- 
tor J. W. Francis, his friend and kind physician 
since the old operatic days, and to whom the aged 
poet had in gratitude addressed a parting ode on 
the day preceding, perceiving symptoms of ap- 
proaching dissolution, notified his numerous friends 
of the change in the venerable patient. It was 
one of those afternoons of waning summer, when 
the mellow sunset foretells approaching autumn. 
The old poet's magnificent head lay upon a sea of 



LORENZO DA PONTE. 265 

pillows, and the conscious eye still shed its beams 
of regard upon all around him. Besides several 
of his countrymen, were assembled some remnants 
of the old Italian troupe, who knelt for a farewell 
blessing around the pallet of their expiring bard ; 
among them might be seen the fine head of 
Fornasari and Signor Bagioli's benevolent coun- 
tenance. All wept as the patriarch bade them an 
affectionate and earnest farewell, and implored a 
blessing on their common country. The doctor, 
watching the flickerings of the life-torch, stood at 
the head of the couch, and a group of fearful 
women at the foot, completed a scene not unlike 
the portraiture we have all seen of the last hours 
of Napoleon/' 

Vicissitudes had made Da Ponte a great ob- 
server of life ; his intimate associations with 
Mozart, the countenance and encouragement he 
received from Joseph II., his acquaintance with 
Metastasio, the lyric poet and writer of operas and 
dramas in Italy, are prominent among the events 
of his earlier career, at which time he established 
his reputation as a melo-dramatist. 

The opportunities which presented themselves 
to me of obtaining circumstantial facts concerning 
Mozart from the personal knowledge of Da Ponte, 
were not so frequent as desirable, but the incidents 
which Da Ponte gave were all of a most agree- 
able character. His accounts strengthened the 
12 



266 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

reports of the ardent, nay, almost impetuous 
energy and industry of Mozart ; l^is promptness 
in decision, and his adventurous intellect. The 
story of Don Juan had indeed become famihar in 
a thousand ways ; Mozart determined to cast the 
opera exclusively as serious, and had well advanced 
in the work. Da Ponte assured me, that he re- 
monstrated and urged the expediency on the great 
composer of the introduction of the vis comica, 
in order to accomplish a greater success, and pre- 
pared the role with Batti, batti, La ci darem, &c. 
How far he influenced Mozart in the composition, 
Nozze de Figaro, I am unprepared to say ; but the 
Libretto of these two works, from the testimony 
of the best judges, enhanced the renown already 
widely recognized of Da Ponte as a dominant 
genius in his profession, enabling melody to pos- 
sess its fullest expression in facile language, and 
with delicacy, simplicity, and exquisite tenderness. 
It will ever remain a difficulty to know why so 
long a time elapsed ere those master works, Don 
Giovanni and Nozze de Figaro, were introduced 
to the admiration of the English public. National 
prejudice had indeed its influence, and the legiti- 
mate drama was disposed to ward off an opponent 
whose powers when once understood were sure to 
rival, in due season, all that the dramatic world 
could summon in its own behalf. Dr. Arne had, 
almost a century before, given a foretaste of the 



LORENZO DA PONTE. 267 

Italian style in his music to Tom Thumb ; and his 
celebrated opera of Artaxerxes, about 1760^ had 
gained the author a vast accession of fame, and 
had dehghted the British nation ; yet Mozart's 
Don Giovanni only saw the Hght of the stage in 
London, in 1817. The mock-bravuras and the 
travesties of Cherry, the patriotic songs of Dibdin 
in the times of England's great struggle, &c., may 
perhaps be considered as among the causes which 
retarded the day when the national taste was to be 
refined by this pure source of intellectual pleasure. 
Such, I think, was in part Da Ponte's views ; but 
he was never very ardent in his praises of the Eng- 
lish as a musical people. Yet it is to be conceded, 
that a foretaste of that gratification which followed 
the advent of Kossini, had been enjoyed in the 
vocal displays of Storace, Billington, and John 
Braham. 

It was easy to perceive, after a short interview 
with Da Ponte, that his capacious intellect was 
filled with bookish wisdom. He had recitals at 
command for the diversity of society in which he 
chanced to be. He loved his beautiful Italy, and 
was prolific in praise of her authors. He extolled 
Caldani and Scarpa, and had many charming 
stories concerning the great illustrator of sound 
and morbid anatomy, Morgagni. Da Ponte at- 
tended the last course of instruction imparted by 
that pre-eminent philosopher, who had then been 



268 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

professor some sixty years. On that memorable 
occasion, when Morgagni was to meet his class for 
the last time, he summoned his cava sposa, Sig- 
nora Morgagni, a lady of noble family, and his 
surviving children, some ten out of fifteen whom 
she had blessed him with, and forming with them 
a group around his person, he pronounced a bene- 
diction on the University and on his class, and 
then aj^pealed to his venerable wife for the fidelity 
of his domestic life, and to his children as the 
tokens of her love and afiection. He was now in 
his ninetieth year. Da Ponte said he was never 
miore in earnest, never more powerful, never more 
eloquent. Padua then lost the brightest teacher 
of anatomical knowledge the world possessed, and 
the University a name in its possession high above 
all others, which commanded the admiration of 
the cultivators of real science wherever the dignity 
and utility of medicine were appreciated. I am 
aware I have trespassed beyond my proper limits 
in this notice, but it was difficult to do otherwise. 
Perhaps at this very day, casting ^ look over the 
many schools of medicine established in this land, 
there is not an individual oftener mentioned in the 
courses of practical instruction, on certain branches, 
than Morgagni, though now dead more than two 
generations. I wished to draw a moral from the 
story, cheering to the devoted student in his 
severe toils to qualify him for medical responsibility. 



MORGAGNI. * 269 

Morgagnij besides great professional acquisitions, 
was a master of elegant literature, an antiquarian 
of research, a proficient in historical lore. The 
learned associations of every order in Europe en- 
rolled him as a member. His numerous writings, 
full of original discoveries, are compressed in five 
huge foHos, and are consulted as a treasury of es- 
tablished facts on a thousand subjects. To his 
responsible duties, involving life and death, he 
superadded for more than sixty years his univer- 
sity teachings, and died at ninety with his mental 
faculties entire. How was the miracle wrought ? 
In the presence of herculean labors, if ennui ever 
dared to approach, an Italian lyric of Metastasio 
was all-sufiicient for relief. By proper frugality 
he secured property ; by a regular life he preserved 
health ; by system and devotion he secured his 
immortal renown. 

Thus much may suffice as a historical record 
of the introduction of the Italian opera in New 
York, and, consequently, in the United States. 
Let the undisputed honor belong to this city. It 
needs no prophetic vision to foresee that time will 
strengthen its power, culture render it more and 
more popular, and that its destiny is fixed among 
the noblest of the Fine Arts among us. It might 
add pleasure on this occasion, did time allow, to 
state particulars concerning the several opera com- 
panies which have favored us witli their presence 



270 HISTORICAL DISCOUESE. 

and their skill since the Garcia period ; the 
Pedrotte company, that of Montressor^ with For- 
nasari, and the memorable displays of Sontag, 
Caradori Allen, Grisi and Alboni : the triumphs 
and career of Ole Bull and of Jenny Lind would 
also enrich a narrative of such transactions with 
the liveliest incidents in proof of the liberality 
of the patrons of this intellectual and refining 
recreation in our metropolis. 

That cultivated gentleman and scholar, Kobert 
Winthrop, in his Address, lately delivered at the 
opening of the grand musical festival at the Music 
Hall, has assigned to Boston the execution of the 
first oratorio in this country, and his researches 
are curious and instructive in the history of music. 
It would seem, from his antiquarian details, that 
the most memorable concert was given at King's 
Chapel, on the 27th of October, 1789, on occasion 
of the visit of George Washington to Boston as 
the first President of the United States. Like a 
philosopher of true sentiment, Mr. Winthrop, 
among many felicitous observations, remarks, 
" What a continued and crowded record does the 
history of the world's great heart present of the 
noble sympathies which have been stirred, of the 
heroic imj)ulses which have been awakened, of the 
devotional fires which have been kindled, of the 
love of God and love to man, and love of country, 
to which animation and utterance have been given 



FINE ARTS. 271 

by the magic power of music." This seems to me 
the true feehng of a man properly indoctrinated. 
I have heard language of like import proceed from 
the lips of John Quincy Adams ; and Carlyle has 
said that music is the speech of angels, and that 
nothing among the utterances allowed to man is 
felt to be so divine. 

I pass on to say a few words in relation to the 
progress among us of another branch of what is 
strictly denominated the Fine Arts and the Arts 
of Design. Admonished by the critical obser- 
vations of Sir Arthur Martin Shee, that there is, 
perhaps, no topic so unmanageable as that of the 
arts in the hands of those who bring to its dis- 
cussion only the superficial acquirements of ama- 
teur taste, I shall exercise a wise prudence in my 
limited notice of the subject. Antiquarian re- 
search will in vain find any proofs of the Fine 
Arts existing in this city ere the lapse of more 
than a century from its first settlement, and then 
the evidences of any thing like an approach to- 
wards their encouragement are hardly worth the 
notice. Our sedate and conservative Dutch an- 
cestors were content with the architectural dis- 
plays of the old-fashioned gable brick residence, 
the glazed tile roof, and the artificial china square 
plate, enriched with grotesque illustrations of 
dykes and wind-mills, and the prodigal son, as 
ornaments for the ample mantel and fire-jams. I 



272 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

have not forgotten the ten commandments thus 
illustrated as decorations of the fireplace in the 
humhle suburban dwelling near the head of Pearl 
street, where I passed my earlier days, at that pe- 
riod of childhood w^hen I studied with overflowing 
tears the mournful story of Cock Robin. Of the 
architecture of their churches or houses of worship, 
I have nothing now to say — the trespass would be 
too great. 

About a century ago might be found, scattered 
here and there, as household decorations, portraits 
by Smybert, Copley, Pine, and old Charles W. 
Peale, of blessed memory, and still later, several 
by West, and many by Stuart. Our Jarvis, In- 
man, and Dunlap, are of quite a recent date. I 
have seen the portraits of the Hunters of Rhode 
Island, by Smybert ; and the Washington by 
Pine, in the possession of the late Henry Bre- 
voort. Smybert, considering the state of the arts 
at that time, possessed more than ordinary merit ; 
and Pine, of whom I have often heard Pintard 
speak, has secured a pecuhar reputation for fidelity 
in portraiture and excellence in coloring. In 
speaking of Smybert, our associate member, the 
venerable Yerplanck remarks, that "he was not 
an artist of the first rank, for the arts were then 
at a very low ebb in England, but the best por- 
traits which we have of the eminent magistrates 
and divines of New England and New York, who 



FINE ARTS. 273 

lived between 1725 and 1751, are from his pencil." 
Trumbull calls Smybert " the patriarch of painting 
in America." Smybert was by birth a Scotchman. 
" He was the first educated artist who visited our 
shores/' says Mr. Tuckerman. To his pencil New 
England is indebted for portraits of many of her 
early statesmen and clergy. Among others, he 
painted for a Scotch gentleman the only authentic 
likeness of Jonathan Edwards.""* It was the ex- 
treme value at which Pintard estimated the pro- 
ductions of Pine, that led him to search so ear- 
nestly for the lost portraits of the Golden family 
by that artist, which you have in your gallery^ and 
we have lately seen the value of his Garrick, from 
a perusal of Yerplanck's interesting letter on the 
subject, published in the " Crayon," a periodical 
under the editorship of the great artist, Durand 
The well-preserved portrait of Dr. Ogilvie, of 
Trinity Church, and now in their collection, is, I 
believe, by Pine. We have, therefore, evidences 
of his great merits to be seen in many places. 
Pintard represented to me that Pine was a Kttle 
fellow, active, assiduous, and ambitious to excel. 
He had received great countenance from the family 
of the Hopkinsons, of Philadelphia. 

We find no statue at this early date as orna- 
mental to our city, if we except that of the elder 

* Essays, Biographical and Critical ; or, Studies of Character. 
By Henry T. Tuckerman. Boston: 8vo. 185'7. 

12* 



274 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Pitt, which stood at the junction of Wall and 
William streets, and the leaden figure of George 
III., in the Bowling Green, both destroyed by 
popular violence in the incipient troubles of the 
Kevolution. 

An approach to a loftier encouragement of the 
Fine Arts was manifested by our civil authorities 
in the selection of the great American historical 
artist, the late Col. Trumbull, who was employed 
to execute, in 1790, the two life-sized paintings of 
Washington and of George Clinton, the revo- 
lutionary general. If we except the Sortie of 
Gibraltar, by the same artist, they may be pro- 
nounced emphatically the great works of this dis- 
tinguished painter. I have often heard the richest 
praises bestowed on these artistic productions, for 
their remarkable fidelity to the originals, by our 
old patriots, who frequently honored them with a 
visit, and who personally were well acquainted 
with the subjects. I can easily imagine the feel- 
ings which glowed in the breast of this long- tried 
patriot and associate of the men of the revolution- 
ary crisis when occupied with these celebrated 
paintings, and how the workings of the soul 
prompted every effort to secure satisfaction in the 
result. Our faithful Lossing's remarks on this 
work of Trumbull correspond with what I have 
again and again heard uttered by the men of '76. 
During his whole life Trumbull seems to have 



JOHN TRUMBULL. 275 

been controlled by the highest motives of patriot- 
ism in order to perjietuate the historical occur- 
rences of his native country ; to secure for pos- 
terity faithful and characteristic likenesses of our 
American heroes and statesmen, seems to have 
been the ultimate desire of his heart, regardless of 
labor or expense. Grreat, indeed, would have been 
our misfortune deprived of his pictorial delin- 
eations of revolutionary times, and the graphic 
exhibitions of his prolific pencil of the men of the 
Eight Years' War. 

This accomplished scholar, enlightened and 
unswerving patriot, eminent artist and delineator 
of American history, closed his honorable career in 
New York, in 1843, in the eighty-eighth year of 
his age. He was conspicuous among the old 
school gentlemen then among us. A few days 
before his death he accepted the presidency of the 
Washington Monument Association, recently or- 
ganized in this city. He readily gave his coun- 
tenance to the work. I attended him in his last 
illness, in consultation with his excellent physician, 
the late Dr. Washington, and it is curious to re- 
mark that the last word he distinctly uttered, on 
his dying bed, was Washington, referring to the 
father of his country, a name often on his lips. 

It hardly falls within my design to enlarge in 
this place on the character and services of Col. 
Trumbull. The Reminiscences which he pub- 



276 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

lished give us the events most prominent in his 
career. A genuine love of country, a noble devo- 
tion to her interest in times of deep adversity, a 
patriotic ardor which led him, in season and out 
of season, amidst almost . insuperable difficulties 
and perils, to rescue the fleeting and precious ma- 
terials which might give additional interest to her 
annals, entitle him to the admiration of all future 
time. We already see that the lapse of each suc- 
cessive day gives increased value to his labors for 
the student of American history. 

The arrival from Europe of that consummate 
genius, Gilbert Stuart, and his settlement in New 
York, in 1793, constitute another era in the pro- 
gress of the Fine Arts among us. This remarkable 
man soon found his talents appreciated and called 
in requisition, and crowds of sitters delighted 
with his artistic abilities. Many of his portraits 
of that period are of special value, and may 
still be found in the residences of our older 
families in this city. Stuart remained but a short 
while with us, yet that brief time was propitious 
to the arts. He had left the old world prompted 
by a noble impulse, and his desire to paint Wash- 
ington was so great as to cause him to leave for 
Philadelphia to gratify his feelings, and it is, per- 
haps, not saying too much, that vast as is the in- 
herent glory which encircles the name of the spot- 
less patriot, the merits of that standard and 



ACADEMY OF ARTS. 277 

unrivalled portrait by Stuart, have augmented 
even the renown of the founder of the Republic. 

The arts of design were promoted by the as- 
siduous labors of Eembrandt Peale, a devoted 
scholar and an artist of wide repute, whose Court 
of Death is among the trophies of the pencil ; and 
by Sharpless, of New York, whom I became well 
acquainted with in his after life. His likenesses, 
in crayon, won general commendation, and justice 
to his memory demands that he be placed in the 
foremost ranks of successful portrait-painters. The 
same remarks will honestly apply to Alexander 
Robertson. 

In sculpture, at and about this time, Houdon 
and Carrachi gave proofs of their mastery in their 
professional line. 

Such was the platform on which the Fine 
Arts rested, when a number of the friends of 
liberal culture and elegant pursuits contemplated 
the organization of the first association in this 
city, under the name of the New York Academy 
of Fine Arts, in 1801. In 1808 it received the 
act of incorporation under the name of the Ameri- 
can Academy of Fine Arts, and Chancellor Living- 
ston was chosen President ; Col. John Trumbull, 
Vice President ; Dewitt Clinton, David Hosack, 
John R. Murray, William Cutting, and Charles 
Wilkes, directors. If we add the names of C. D. 
Colden, Edward Livingston, and Robert Fulton, 



278 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

we include in this enumeration the leading New 
Yorkers who, for years, were liberal in their patron- 
age to promote the undertaking. Through the 
instrumentality of the American minister at the 
court of France, Napoleon presented to the in- 
stitution many valuable busts, antique statues, 
and rare prints. I can dwell but a moment longer 
on the fortunes of this Academy. After several 
years of trial and neglect it was revived in 1816. 
Certain paintings of West, which for a time were 
added to its collections through the kindness of 
Kobert Fulton, with the Ariadne of Yanderlyn, 
and other results of the easel of that distinguished 
artist, sustained it for a few years longer from dis- 
solution, while the several addresses of Clinton, 
Hosack, and Trumbull, gave it for a season addi- 
tional popularity. At this particular crisis in the 
Academy, a measure long contemplated was at- 
tempted to be carried into effect, viz., the organi- 
zation of a School of Instruction, by lectures, 
models, and by anatomical illustrations. The 
distinction was conferred on me of professor of the 
Anatomy of Painting ; and although miserably 
deficient in the great requisites demanded in a suc- 
cessful teacher of so refined a study, I was not 
wholly ignorant of what William Hunter and 
John Sheldon and Charles Bell had done, and I 
commenced preparations under the guidance of 
Col. Trumbull ; but within a very short time the 



ACADEMY OF DESIGN. 279 

straightened condition of the Academy put a 
period to all plans cherished to protect its dura- 
tion and increase its usefulness. With the down- 
fall of the American Academy, the National Acad- 
emy of Design took its rise about 1828. S. F. B. 
Morse, he who has recently become so famous by 
his invention of the electric telegraph, was elected 
President, and the constitutional provisions of this 
association being far more acceptable to the feel- 
ings and views of a large majority of the artists 
than the old Academy favored, it has proved an 
eminently successful corporation, and has aided in 
numerous ways the promotion of its specified 
objects, the Arts of Design. The plan of Ana- 
tomical Lectures was now carried into effect, and 
Morse, and Dr. F. G. King, gave instruction to 
numerous scholars for a succession of years. The 
devotion given to this institution by Thomas S. 
Cummings, in the instruction he for a series of 
years has imparted to students of art in the hfe. 
and antique school, has also proved a constant 
source of gratification and improvement to the 
pupil in this elegant pursuit. 

He who is solicitous to study historically the 
subject of the Fine Arts in this city, and to know 
their progress in other cities of the Union, will 
consult the work of William Dunlap, a writer of 
patient research, and abating the influence of oc- 
casional prejudice, a reliable authority. And could 



280 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

I, like Sir "Walter Ealeigh, compress the history 
of the world in a volume, I should record many- 
things more amply, and be willing to take an ex- 
tended notice of the Apollo Association, which, 
some time after its formation, merged into the 
American Art Union, and which for a series of 
years exerted a wholesome influence in the diffu- 
sion of an improved taste, which was no less con- 
ducive to the fiscal advantage of those ingenious 
men most interested in the popularity of their 
important calling. The enlarged views and public 
spirit of James Herring in this goodly undertaking, 
ought not to be passed over ; his labor and talents 
united with Longacre, and appropriated to the 
Biography of Distinguished Americans, accom- 
plished much for the arts and for national history. 

If it be asked, have the Fine Arts, during the 
incorporation of our Historical Society, advanced 
in this city under the countenance of these several 
institutions, it may be safely responded to in the 
affirmative. Great and distinctive as niay have 
been the individual merits of many adepts, such 
as Allston, Yanderlyn, Peale, Durand, Cole, 
^Waldo, Jarvis, Inman, Mount, Stearns, and 
others, by association a still greater power was 
wielded and successfully carried into operation in 
behalf of this branch of refined knowledge. 

It is not to be concealed that some of our 
artists pursue their calling chiefly to secure a live- 



A. H. WENZLER. 281 

lihood, yet there are many others who cherish a 
higher ideal ; imbued with the greatest earnest- 
ness, patience, and faith, they have striven to 
comiDrehend the secrets of nature and achieve more 
than a temporary fame, the consciousness of orig- 
inal research and inspiration. In the enumeration 
of this class of painters, I would place A. H. 
Wenzler, so famiharly known by his unrivalled 
miniatures. For years his studies have been di- 
rected to the philosophy of colors. I borrow in 
part the language of a classical writer on art, who 
appears to comprehend the subject. " Mr Wenzler 
has been convinced,'' (says tliis acute writer,) ^^that 
the illusion of distance, so requisite to landscape- 
painting, is not to be realized by perspective lines, 
but by the gradation of tints so obvious to nature. 
In order to demonstrate this, he has merely de- 
picted in rough the material objects of a land- 
scape — trees, rocks, a stream, a church, and a 
meadow, and over the whole, including a range of 
hills in the background, thrown these naturally 
graduated tints, from the prismatic rays in the 
immediate vicinity of the sun, to the cool light of 
the distant earth : the effect is exactly like nature ; 
you imagine yourself gazing through an open win- 
dow upon an actual scene ; the distances through- 
out the picture are so natural that we feel, for the 
first time in art, an harmonious and complete 
aerial perspective. It opens a new sphere of artis- 



282 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

tic truth, and vindicates a hitherto unacknowledged 
law ; it embodies in theory what Turner aimed 
at." An accomplished writer on the state of art 
in the United States, Dr. Bethune, in Putnam's 
Home Book of the Picturesque, in adverting to 
the hindrances which have operated on the pro- 
gress of the Fine Arts in the early condition of 
America, has beautifully and truthfully expressed 
himself in these words : " Under the pressure of 
cares and struggles and urgent anxieties, there 
would be neither time nor desire for the cultivation 
of these elegant pursuits, which are the luxury of 
leisure, the decoration of wealth, and the charms 
of refinement. The Puritans and the Presbyterians 
together, the most influential, were not favorable 
to the fine arts, and the Quakers abjured them. 
Men li\dng in log cabins and busied all day in 
fields, workshop or warehouse, and liable to attacks 
by savage enemies at any moment, were indisposed 
to seek after or encourage what was not imme- 
diately useful. Their hard-earned and precarious 
gains would not justify the indulgence. There 
were few, or rather no specimens of artistic skill 
among them to awaken taste or imitation. It is, 
therefore, little to be wondered at if they did not 
show an appreciation of art proportionate to their 
advance in other moral respects, or that they 
waited until they had secured a substantial pros- 
perity before they ventured to gratify themselves 



ARTISTS. 283 

with the heautifuL The brilliant examples of 
West and Copley, with some others of inferior 
note, showed the j^resence of genius, but those 
artists found abroad the encouragement and in- 
Btruction not attainable at home, thus depriving 
their country of all share in their fame, except the 
credit of having given them birth." 

I incline strongly to the opinion that our 
country is destined to great distinction in the arts 
of design, as she is already acknowledged to excel 
in many of the most prominent and important of 
the mechanical arts. There is a genius through- 
out the land developing itself in these elevated 
pursuits. In steam navigation what has she not 
accomplished since the mighty innovation of Ful- 
ton ? in naval architecture where has she a rival ? 
Where shall I find room for an enumeration of her 
thousand discoveries and improvements (not no- 
tions) in mechanics, in the arts of husbandry, in 
that art of arts, printing,and in the lightning press 
of Hoe ? In sculpture she presents a Greenough, 
a Powers, a Frazee, a Clavenger, a Brown, and 
her wondrous Crawford, a native of this city. In 
painting, how rarely have happier disj^lays of 
genius been furnished in modern time, than are 
given us by Durand, Weir, Elliot, Huntington, 
Bogle, Hicks, Stagg, and Church. Had we room 
we might feel ourselves ennobled in contemplating 
the individual triumphs and merits of the devoted 



284 HISTORICAL DISCOUESE. 

disciples of the fine arts our country lias pro- 
duced. 

An undertaking of this nature, though not 
imperative, would lead to reflections cheering to 
our feelings, and gratifying in even a national 
point of view. We have noted that the original 
Academy of Arts, through fiscal embarrassments 
and other causes, terminated its career — the once 
popular Art-Union, to the regret of many, no 
longer exists, and the pioneers in New York artis- 
tic fame, Vanderlyn, Jarvis, Inman, and others 
are no more, — while Morse has left painting to 
acquire lasting renown in science, there are signs 
of the times which indicate that this metropoHs 
has steadily advanced, and our country made de- 
cisive progress, both in facilities for the student 
and in the fame of the votaries of art. Let me 
recall to your minds the fact, that at this moment 
there are 02)en in our city adequate galleries of 
painting representative of each great school, the 
Italian, French, English, and German ; that the 
enterprise of a Bryan, and a Boker, have brought 
home to us the " old masters," and the finest mod- 
ern painters of the Khine ; that the munificent 
patronage of a Lenox, a Belmont, a Cozzens, a 
Sturgis, and a Leupp, has garnered up some of the 
choicest specimens of European and native art to 
adorn the private mansions of New York. Our 
Historical Society has also added a permanent 



WORKS OF ART. 285 

gallery to its library. More than one English 
nobleman has given Kensett an order for his 
graphic American scenes ; Kusldn, the famous 
art-critic, is, we are told, a frequent visitor of 
Cropsey, at his studio at Kensington ; the name 
of Page is honored at Kome as that of the first 
portrait-painter of the Eternal City ; Cole's " Voy- 
age of Life" has afforded a series of the choicest 
modern engravings, as popular as they are poet- 
ical ; Church's Niagara was a theme of universal 
admiration in London ; Leutze stands high among 
the Dusseldorf painters ; a constant throng sur- 
rounded Powers' Greek Slave at the World's Fair 
in the original Crystal Palace ; at Munich, Craw- 
ford's Washington was pronounced by all, from 
the King of Bavaria to the oldest artist, the 
noblest equestrian statue of the age, and now that 
death has canonized his fame, it is allowed that 
no sculptor of his years ever accomplished so much 
and so well ; Palmer, a son of your own State, 
has made ideal heads in marble of the most ex- 
quisite and original beauty ; ''' Durand, it has been 
truly said, expresses on canvas the sentiment of 
the picturesque, in the same spirit as Bryant in 
verse ; Barley's "Illustrations of Margaret" have 
been pronounced by competent foreign critics as 
the best Outline, for expression, grace, and signifi- 

* For an account of this self-taught artist, see "the Sculptor 
of Albany " in Putnam's Monthly. 



286 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

cance, since those of Ketzcli ; Elliot paints vener- 
able heads with much of the vigor and freshness 
of color for which Stuart was remarkable ; Chap- 
man's Drawing Book is the most scientific and 
practically valuable treatise of the kind yet pub- 
Hshed ; and for a memoir of AUston's life and 
labors, hitherto better appreciated abroad than at 
home, let me refer you to the New American En- 
cyclopaedia. One of our merchants has lately 
erected a costly edifice here expressly for studios, 
and a prosperous citizen of New Jersey commis- 
sioned Huntington, Kossiter, Hicks, and Baker, to 
execute respectively elaborate portrait groups of 
the leading scientific men, merchants, authors, 
and artists of America. These few hasty sug- 
gestions will serve to evidence how much has been 
and is doing in the highest spheres of Art-culture 
among us, and no small part thereof dates from 
our Association with our own city. The classical 
volume of Mr. Tuckerman, entitled Artist-Life, 
will prove an advantageous work to all who study 
the achievements of American Pictorial Genius. 

The art of engraving on wood was first under- 
taken in this country in New York, by Alexander 
Anderson, a native ot this city, about the year 
1794. This ingenious artist, still alive and in 
full employment, now in his 83d year, was origi- 
nally a physician, and had graduated M. D. in 
Columbia College. The extent of his labors in 



ENGBAVEES ON WOOD. 287 

the profession lie has exercised so long can scarcely 
be calculated. He has often been termed a second 
Bewick. Contemporary with Anderson we find Ma- 
son, Lansing, Adams, Bobbett, and Lossing. The 
success of American talent in this pecuhar depart- 
ment of the Arts of Design has commanded the 
approbation of the severest critics ; and the Field- 
Book of the American Revolution, by Benson J. 
Lossing, may be cited for the excellencies which 
have resulted from the combined talents of that 
truthful writer as designer, engraver, and author 
of this work of extensive research, originality, and 
fidelity. Yet later, this species of engraving has 
been adopted still more extensively, the photo- 
graphic art, independent of drawing, being directly 
applied to the wood itself, by its inventor, Mr. 
Price. As a steel engraver of historical portraits, 
Jackman is pre-eminent. 

In order to render the fragmentary records of 
this address less imperfect in relation to the social 
features of New York, a sentence or two may find 
a place here concerning a peculiarity which early 
took its rise in our cosmopolitan city. Our Dutch 
annals of domestic society and manners are not 
entirely free of this distinctive feature, and our 
undying historian, Deiderich Knickerbocker, seems 
to glance at this circumstance amid all the turmoil 
and vicissitudes of our early Dutch governors, as 
one which at times Kghtened the cares of official 



288 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

station, and rendered tlie duties of office less bur- 
thensome : I allude to the formation or the estab- 
lishment of those social compacts called Clubs. 
The curious and instructive contents of the work 
recently pubhshed, entitled the Huguenot Family, 
by Miss Maury, depict lights and shades of social 
relationship that awaken reminiscences of illus- 
trative value. Not many years after English pos- 
session of Manhattan, we find that our royal gov- 
ernors and their immediate dependents were wont 
to assemble together, the better to discuss pubhc 
affairs and enjoy the temporal benefits of the social 
board. We find a convivial club of jDrofessional 
gentlemen in New York about 1750, and that 
John Bard, Cadwallader D. Golden, Leonard Cut- 
ting and others were of the membership. Frank- 
lin occasionally honored them with his presence. 
Still later, and about the time the revolution of '76 
broke out, the Social Club was created in New 
York, and continued its existence in this city until 
the capture of Cornwallis led to their sudden dis- 
solution. This club, it is almost superfluous to 
say, was composed chiefly of the tory party ; the 
most eminent in the law and in the other liberal 
pursuits were of the number : Lieutenant Gov- 
ernor Moore, Colden, S. Bard, Miles Cooper, and 
Dr. Clossy, are included in the list. After the 
peace of 1783, several years appear to have elapsed 
without any special organization of a private or 



BELVIDEEE CLUB. 289 

social kind, when, in 1789, St. Tammany erected 
her standard on the broad and popular grounds of 
American rights, and secured by legislation her 
charter powers. I was well acquainted, at a 
juvenile period of my life, with William Mooney, 
their first sachem, and in after years knew many 
of their primary and most efficient members, as 
C. D. Golden, J. 0. Hoffman, and others. The 
Belvidere Club took its origin u]3on the arrival of 
the Ambuscade with the memorable citizen Genet. 
By many he is reported to have founded the Jacobin 
Clubs, but he was a Girondist. The Belvidere was 
an hilarious association. The names of Atkinson, 
Gouveneur, Kemble, Baretto, Seaton, Marston, 
White, Fish, are to be found in their Hst of mem- 
bers. It was strong in the promulgation of popu- 
lar rights and in vindication of the democratic ele- 
ment. John Keed, a well-known bookseller of that 
period had, as the prominent decoration of his store, 
the sign of the head of Thomas Paine, an index 
of the reigning spirit of the time. The Fi^iendly 
Club, under the presidency of General Laight, ex- 
isted for some few years about this period of politi- 
cal agitation ; but I am ignorant whether political 
discussion absorbed any of its cares. A hterary 
confederarcy about the same period, viz., 1792-3, 
was formed, the design of which was of an intel- 
lectual rather than of a social or festive nature. 
It was caUed the Drone. The particular aim of 



290 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

its members seems to have been tbe cultivation 
and diffusion of letters, constituting a sort of 
society for mutual mental advancement. Every 
member, I believe, was to be recognized by proofs 
of authorship ; and when we turn over the cata- 
logue of their names we must be ready to allow 
they were tenacious of their specific intent. I 
have already mentioned in other parts of this Dis- 
course many of this Association. Law, physic and 
divinity had each their representatives among 
them. The old Chancellor Samuel Jones, who 
died recently, was on this recorded list, and proved 
their last survivor. Our famous Dr. Mitchill was 
of the number, and with that remarkable pecu- 
liarity which so often characterized him, he ad- 
dressed the ladies through the medium of the 
Drones on the value of whitewashing, as among 
the most important of the Hygienic arts in house- 
keeping, thus perpetually vindicating the saving 
efficacy of the alkahs, most effectually to eradicate 
that evil genius, Septon, the destroyer of the 
physical world. Samuel Miller, John Blair Linn, 
and William Dunlop, were for a time associates, 
and Josiah Ogden Hoffman, who occasionally fur- 
nished a law decision, sometimes an Indian frag- 
ment, and sometimes a poetic stave. Charles 
Brockden Brown, I have reason to think, was an 
associate. John Wells, afterwards the great and 
eloquent lawyer, here, I apprehend, first commu- 



BREAD AND CHEESE CLUB. 291 

nicated his lucubrations on the importance of a 
steady cultivation of the Lombardy poplar for 
American agriculture, at the very time when the 
indignation of the community was waxing warm 
touching the pernicious tendency of this wide- 
spreading exotic. 

The Bread and Cheese Club originated in 
1824, through the instrumentality of James Feni- 
more Cooper. Shortly after his renown burst forth 
as the author of the Spy. The selection of mem- 
bers for nomination to this fraternity rested, I be- 
lieve, entirely with him : bread and cheese were 
the ballots used, and one of cheese decided ad- 
versely to admittance, so that in fact a unanimous 
vote was essential to membership. This associa- 
tion generally met at the Washington Hall once, 
if I remember rightly, every fortnight, during the 
winter season. It included a large number of the 
most conspicuous of professional men, statesmen, 
lawyers, and physicians. Science was not absent. 
I cannot in this place attempt any thing like an 
enumeration of the fellows. Our most renowned 
poet was Halleck, our greatest naturalist was De 
Kay : William and John Duer were among the 
representatives of the bar; Renwick, of philos- 
ophy ; letters found associates in Verplanck and 
King ; merchants, in Charles A. Davis and Philip 
Hone ; and politicians, who had long before dis- 
charged their pubhc trusts, were here and there 



292 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

chronicled in fellowsliip. The meetings of the Chib 
(or Lunch) were often swelled to quite a formidable 
assembly by members of Congress, senators, and 
representatives, and in this array were often found 
Webster and Storrs, W. B. Lawrence, and the 
French minister, Hyde de Neuville. To alleviate 
the dryness of detail, I may here perhaps invade 
the sanctity of social transaction ; but the occur- 
rence to which I allude is innocent, and may be 
deemed curious as well as rare. A theatrical 
benefit had been announced at the Park, and 
Hamlet the play. A subordinate of the theatre 
at a late hour hurried to my office for a skull ; I 
was compelled to loan the head of my old friend, 
George Frederick Cooke. " Alas, poor Yorick ! " 
It was returned in the morning ; but on the en- 
suing evening, at a meeting of the Cooper Club, 
the circumstance becoming known to several of the 
members, and a general desire being expressed to 
investigate phrenologically the head of the great 
tragedian, the article was again released from its 
privacy, when Daniel Webster, Henry Wheaton, 
and many others who enriched the meeting of that 
night, applied the principles of craniological science 
to the interesting specimen before them ; the head 
was pronounced capacious, the function of animal- 
ity amply developed ; the height of the forehead 
ordinary ; the space between the orbits of unusual 
breadth, giving proofs of strong perceptive powers ; 



SKETCH CLUB. 293 

the transverse basilar portion of the skull of corre- 
sponding width. Such was the phrenology of 
Cooke. This scientific exploration added to the 
variety and gratifications of that memorable meet- 
ing. Cooper felt as a coadjutor of Albinus, and 
Cooke enacted a great part that night. 

The Sketch Chih, originally intended as an ar- 
tistic fraternity, yet gradually including gentlemen 
of other professions but interested in art, still 
flourishes and boasts as original members Yer- 
planck and Bryant. A sketch of its history ex- 
ists, if I mistake not, from the facile pen of one 
of its founders, the late gifted Eobert C. Sands. 
The Sketch Club meets bi-monthly at the mem- 
bers' dwellings during the winter. The luxury of 
the Union and the social enterprise of the Century 
Club are on a larger scale, and partake of the 
metropoHtan spirit of the day. 

I shall terminate these hasty notices of those 
social compacts denominated Clubs, which, as 
before stated, seem to have very early constituted 
a striking feature in New York society, and, at 
difi'erent eras in its progress,' marked its advance 
in refinement and affluence, with a -brief account 
of the last organization of that nature which had 
its existence among us : I allude to the Hone 
Cluh, founded some twenty-two years ago, the 
original projector being the late distinguished 
Philip Hone. It was circumscribed in numbers, 



294 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

and was rarely pennitted to include more than 
twenty members. It abjured discussions on theo- 
logical dogmas, on party politics, and individual 
personalities. Its themes were the American Revo- 
lution and its heroes ; the framers of the Consti- 
tution, the United States judiciary, New York 
and her improvements, Clinton and the canal, the 
mercantile advancement of the city, banks, Wash- 
ington and Hamilton, Hancock and Adams, the 
Union and its powers. It justly boasted of its 
strong disciples, and gathered at its festivals the 
leading men of the Republic. "Webster was 
cherished as a divinity among them, and in this 
circle of unalloyed friendship and devotion his 
absorbed mind often experienced relief in the cheer- 
ing views of busy life imparted by his associates 
and in the estimates formed of national measures ; 
while he himself proved the great expositor of 
characters deceased, something after the manner 
of another Plutarch, the instructive chronicler of 
historical events lost in the mysticism of conflict- 
ing accounts, and the vindicator of the genius and 
wisdom of government founded on cautious legis- 
lation and conservative polity. I never heard a 
breath in this Club of South or North : it had 
broader views and more congenial topics. Web- 
ster talked of the whole country — its seas, its 
lakes, its rivers ; its native products, its forests, 
from the pinus Douglassii to the willow at the 



HONE CLUB. 295 

brook ; from the buffalo of the prairie to the fire- 
fly of the garden. I have seldom encountered a 
naturalist who had so prompt a knowledge of the 
kingdom of nature. The gatherings of the Hone 
Club were cordial communions of a most at- 
tractive character ; they were held at intervals of 
a fortnight, and they only ceased upon the demise 
of their benevolent founder. Their festivals were 
of the highest order of gustatory enjoyment, — the 
appetite could ask no more, — and a Devonshire 
duke might have been astounded at the amplitude 
of the repast, and the richness and style of the 
entertainment. When I have conned over the 
unadorned simplicity of our ancestors, and had 
authentic records for the fact that at their more 
sumptuous demonstrations of hospitality, corned 
beef might have been decorating the board at both 
ends, constituting what the host called a tautology, 
and that old Schiedam imported by Anthony 
Doyer, made up the popular exhilarating bever- 
age, and compared what I now witnessed in these 
my own days, the canvass backs and grouse hardly 
invoking appetite; that "nabob'' would stand 
without reproach, and Bingham alone receive the 
attention due its merit, I am irresistibly led to 
the conclusion arrived at on a different occasion, by 
my friend Pintard, that there is a great deal of 
good picking to be found in this wicked world, but 
that the chances of possession are somewhat rare. 



296 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

And yet this ratio of things is not perhaps dispro- 
portionate to other circumstances. Within less 
than a century the city's progress in the com- 
forts and luxuries of existence is a noticeable oc- 
currence : New York in that interval, from the 
scattered village has become the metropolis of the 
Union ; the sohtary carriage of Lieut. Governor 
Golden and the httle carry-all of Dr. John Bard, 
(the only doctor of the day who was not a pedes- 
trian,) have multiplied into their tens of thousands 
of vehicles ; and the doctor^s fee of half a crown 
has augmented to the tangible value of a one 
pound note. When calling to mind the Hone 
Club memory dwells with gratitude on the accom- 
modating functions of the gastric powers and the 
beneficent means which seem provided for their 
normal continuance. 

My most excellent friend, and I may call him 
the friend of mankind, Philip Hone, died of pro- 
tracted illness at his residence in this city, in May, 
1851, in the 71st year of his age, to the deep 
regret of the community. I cannot find a more 
appropriate opportunity than this place of giving 
some record of his hfe and character. His career 
is an event which blends itself with the civil 
progress and history of New York. The Histori- 
cal Society were not indifierent at his death, as he 
was long associated with them as member and in 
several offices of trust and responsibility. As an 



PHILIP HONE. 297 

old and intimate friend of Mr. Hone, my relations 
to him are among the most cherished of my pro- 
fessional experience. The urbanity and high tone 
of sentiment which distinguished him endeared 
his name as a true gentleman ; his great industry 
in the cultivation of his mind, and the acquisition 
of knowledge amid the absorbing cares of mercan- 
tile life, is an example worthy of the highest re- 
spect ; while the steadfast integrity which was the 
noblest element of his character will secure for it 
enduring honor. Philip Hone, in addition to these 
claims upon our affection as a man, possessed 
others none the less rare as a citizen. He was a 
thorough American in feeling and principle, and a 
genuine Knickerbocker in local attachment and in 
public spirit. He watched with most intelligent 
zeal over the fortunes of this growing metropolis, 
identified himself with every project for its ad- 
vancement, and labored with filial devotion in her 
behalf. Our most useful as well as most orna- 
mental changes won his attention and enlisted his 
aid. From the laying a Kuss pavement to the elab- 
oration of a church portico ; from the widening 
of a street avenue to the magnificent enterprise 
that resulted in the Croton Aqueduct, Mr. Hone 
was the efiicient coadjutor of his fellow-citizens. 
He was eminently conspicuous among the most 
eminent of our active and exalted men. Several 
of our most important and useful institutions are 
13* 



298 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

largely indebted to him for their successful estab- 
lishment. With the late John Pintard, and Wil- 
liam Bayard and Theodore Dwight, he assiduously 
devoted his best energies in rearing the Savings 
Bank ; and the Clinton Hall Association, with its 
important branch the Mercantile Library, are in- 
debted to him as its founder and benefactor. He 
also, with others of the Hone family, gave support 
to the canal policy of his persecuted friend, De- 
witt Chnton. I believe it is admitted without 
a dissentient voice, that, as Mayor of New York, 
he is to be classed among the most competent and 
able Chief Magistrates our city ever possessed. 

At the i^eriod of Mr. Hone's birth his native 
city contained about twenty thousand inhabitants, 
and at the time of his exit five hundred thousand 
had been added to that number. It can be easily 
understood that so active a spirit in deeds of good 
report, for some thirty years and upwards, must 
have largely contributed to the promotion of the 
numerous works of beneficence and knowledge 
which have marked the career of so progressive 
and enterprising a population, ' amid whom he 
lived and labored. Your records will point out 
the service he rendered your Historical Society ; 
but I forbear to be more minute. 

Mr. Hone's career as a merchant precluded ex- 
tensive triumphs of scholarship. His mind was 
but partially imbued with classical lore ; but its 



PHILIP HONE. 299 

ceaseless activity, elegant tone, and judicious di- 
rection, rendered it not only a delightful resource 
to its possessor, but a blessing to tbe community. 
There can be little doubt that bis Private Diary, 
embracing the records of his life and associations 
for a long number of years, will prove an historical 
document of permanent value. Through transla- 
tions Mr. Hone had grown familiar with the spirit 
and imagery of classical and Italian literature. 
Homer and Tasso he read with delight ; but his 
favorite department of study was history, and 
here he was thoroughly at home and a credit to 
the Historical Society. Thus his public spirit, his 
private character, gentlemanly address, studious 
habits, and fiscal integrity, combine to form a har- 
monious and noble specimen of character of which 
our city is proud, and around which will ever hang 
the incense of our undying remembrance. To 
these feeble expressions of my estimate of Mr. 
Hone, I may be permitted to add that his personal 
appearance was of an elegant and commanding 
order ; that * his physical infirmities for some 
time, though they invaded not his intellectual 
faculties, gradually prepared him to foresee his 
earthly departure was at hand. Sustained by the 
consolations of religion, and surrounded by his 
family, he closed his useful life, sensible to the 
last, composed and resigned. 

Coincident with the increase of our social and 



300 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

artistic resources, those of literature and science 
began to exhibit a magnitude and permanence 
worthy of a great and growing metropolis. By 
the munificent bequest of John Jacob Astor, and 
the wise self-devotion of Dr. Cogswell, a Library 
now exists here second to none in the world for 
the choice, conveniently arranged, and most re- 
quisite books for the scholar and general inquirer. 
The building, the exquisitely filled alcoves, the dis- 
tribution and the gradual increase of the Astor 
Library, are admired by each visitor in proportion 
to his erudition, taste, and famiharity with other 
institutions of a kindred character. Foreign 
scholars, of whom political exigencies have driven 
hundreds to our shores, find the Astor Library, 
free as it is, the most charming resort in New 
York. The additional gift of the son of the 
founder will soon double the space, treasures, and 
usefulness of the noble institution which will bear 
his father's name in grateful remembrance to the 
latest posterity. * 

I cannot dwell upon the several benefits arising 
to the youth of the city from the Mercantile Li- 
brary ; from the Apprentices' Library ; the Franklin 
Library, the offspring of the Typographical Asso- 
ciation ; from the rising Institute of the philan- 
thropic Cooper ; from the conservative enjoyment 
derived from the Society Library : but I must 
refer to the precious collection of Egyptian an- 



EGYPTIAN MUSEUM. 301 

tiquities brouglit hither by Dr. Abbott, of Cairo, 
and now awaiting the purchase money destined, I 
am confident, sooner or later to secure them to our 
city. The renowned Egyptologist, Seyfforth, has 
borne testimony to the distinctive value of this 
unique collection ; one of your most learned cler- 
gymen. Rev. Dr. Thompson, has elucidated thereby 
the speciah'ties of Biblical history ; an artist, Eu- 
genio Latilla, has illustrated the origin and growth 
of early art from the same materials. Professor 
Felton, of Harvard University, recently read a 
paper before the American Academy of Arts and 
Sciences in Boston, detaihng his examination of a 
Greek inscription on one of the venerable tablets 
conserved in this museum, and then urged upon 
the Academy its rare worth, assuring them that, 
having visited the chief Egyptian Museums of 
Europe, he found objects in that of New York 
not elsewhere preserved. We must deem it a for- 
tunate circumstance that, now when the collection 
of Egyptian antiquities is so difficult, and the 
entire series so rare, our city boasts so complete 
and authentic a museum in a department of ines- 
timable importance as illustrating the domestic 
economy, arts, manufactures and sepulchral in- 
signia, as well as the lore and the actual history 
of the land of the Ptolemies. 

A striking characteristic of New York which 
reflects signal honor on the benevolence and hu- 



302 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

manity of her people, was early visible in her civic 
progress. The wholesome axioros of her primitive 
Dutch settlers and her cultivated Huguenots, soon 
led to the formation of schools for the cultivation 
of knowledge and the advancement of sound 
morals ; and shortly after the commencement of 
her career, indeed as far back as the year 1699, 
when her population scarcely exceeded six thou- 
sand. Dr. McCready in his late historical address 
assures us, on the authority of our city's chronicler, 
David Valentine, that the poor received partial 
relief in their own houses or in lodgings specially 
provided. Some twenty years after, an almshouse 
was erected near the spot where the City Hall now 
stands. This institution held its locality for some 
seventy years or more ; with the collateral aid of 
a dispensary, which owed its origin chiefly to Dr. 
John Bard, the indigent found succor and reHef. 
The almshouse yielded medical instruction by the 
clinical talents of Dr. William Moore, Dr. Richard 
S. Kissam, and Dr. Nicholas Romayne. In 1769 
a pest-house was estabHshed for the reception of 
diseased emigrants, and the organization of a med- 
ical society in 1788, placed John Bard at its head 
as president. Through the efficient instrumental- 
ity of Drs. Peter Middleton, John Jones, and Sam- 
uel Bard, we find the New York Hospital took its 
rise and was chartered in 1771. In 1790 we find 
the first of our city dispensaries in operation ; 



BELLEVUE HOSPITAL. 303 

five years after commenced the rebuilding of 
the great city almshouse on the site of the old 
edifice in the Park, and which in 1812 was con- 
verted to other purposes, literary and historical, 
and destroyed by fire some three or four years ago. 
From- historical data, I am authorized to state, 
that these several institutions yielded curative and 
saving benefits to multitudes of the indigent and 
the afflicted, under the direction of a wise super- 
vision and the talents of able clinical direction, 
medical and surgical. The original faculty of 
physic organized by King's (subsequently Colum- 
bia) College, were among the prominent teachers 
and prescribers, and Bard and Clossy, and after- 
wards Bayley, Hosack, Mitchill, Post, Crosby, and 
Nicholls, are to be enumerated. 

In 1811 was projected the ample Belle vue 
Hospital and Almshouse, which was rendered fit 
for the reception of its inmates in 1816 ; Dr. Mc- 
Cready tells us, from official records, at a cost of 
nearly half a million of dollars. The medical 
government of this great estabhshment was placed 
under a visiting or consulting physician, while the 
immediate attendance was confided to one or two 
physicians who resided in the institution. A 
malignant typhus or hospital fever breaking out, 
which made great havoc both with the patients 
and the doctors themselves, led to the appointment 
of a special committee of inquiry into errors and 



304 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

abuses, when Dr. Joseph M. Smith and Dr. Isaac 
Wood assumed the medical management. The 
occasion gave origin to the Fever Hospital at the 
recommendation of Dr. David Hosack, to which 
charity the febrile cases were transferred, when 
within a month the pestilence was happily at an 
end. Dr. Isaac Wood now received the appoint- 
ment of resident physician of the Bellevue Hos- 
pital, and held the office seven years, with signal 
benefit to the pubHc interests and to humanity, 
when his resignation led to the acce23lance of the 
trust by Dr. B. Ogden. The tortuous policy of 
politics, however, now led to party appointments, 
and the evils incident to such policy flowed in with 
increased force ; inexperience betrayed her incom- 
petency, and the soundest whiggism and most 
radical democracy often proved equally ignorant of 
the principles of hygiene and curative measures. 
Typhus again resumed her work, and change be- 
came imperative. In the midst of revolutionary 
struggles, in order to rectify this deplorable condi- 
tion the government of this great institution was 
at length placed under the medical discipline of 
Dr. David M. Reese, as physician in chief. Jus- 
tice demands that it be recorded, that this appoint- 
ment led to a great reformation. Dr. Reese, during 
his term of office, stood forward the champion of 
innovation and improvement, and displayed in a 



BELLEVUE HOSPITAL. 305 

noble cause a perseverance and ability which have 
proved of lasting benefit. 

In 1849 the office of Kesident Physician was 
aboHshed by the Board of Governors of the Alms- 
house, to whom the control of the establishment 
had passed, and the administration of the medical 
department of the Bellevue given over entirely to 
a Medical Board. Enlargements of this vast 
charity have from time to time been made com- 
mensurate to the wants of an increasing popula- 
tion, and advantageous improvements have been 
adopted, characteristic of the enlarged policy of 
our municipal authorities ; and, were I to dwell 
longer on the subject, I might adopt with benefit 
the eulogistic language which Dr. McC ready em- 
ploys when speaking of the present renovated state 
of the edifice, . its ample dimensions, the conve- 
nient disposition of its large and airy wards, sup- 
plied with every essential want for the afflicted, 
and its peculiarly sanative location on the borders 
of the East Kiver. 

The Bellevue Hospital may well be pronounced 
a noble rival to the finest and best-conducted 
charities in the world. As a school of practical 
medicine and surgery, its claims will be conceded 
by all ; and from my official connection with its 
affairs, for some years, I can testify to the disin- 
terested zeal and benevolence and devotion which 
dignify its medical and surgical Board, and clini- 



306 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

cal instructors. It is due to individual zeal and 
professional ardor to add that the great field of 
medical and surgical practice which the Bellevue 
Hospital presents, has recently led to the formation 
of a museum of pathological anatomy, by Dr. J. 
R. Wood, one of the clinical instructors. 

But where am I to stop when I have entered 
upon a consideration of the humane and benevo- 
lent institutions of this metropolis ? the briefest 
notice of those alone which have been created, 
since the incorporation of the Historical Society, 
by legislative authority and individual liberality, 
would fill a volume. Some other occasions may 
be appropriated to so instructive an undertaking. 
Among her thousand claims to commendation, I 
consider the charities of this metropolitan city the 
noblest trophy she bears ; and as I am much in 
the habit of connecting with her various institu- 
tions the names and promoters of those beneficent 
foundations, I cannot separate the blessings which 
have been imparted to suffering mortals during the 
long career of the New York Hospital, the wisdom 
imparted by clinical instruction to the hosts of 
students who have resorted thither for some two 
or three generations, and the triumphs of skill 
which the professional literature of the country 
records, achieved by Bayley, Post, Hosack, Kissam, 
Seaman, Stringham, and Mott. Memoirs of these 
eminent professors of the art of healing have long 



RICHARD S. KISSAM. 307 

been before the public. Yet I could have wished 
that some surgical friend had delineated, with 
more satisfaction than has yet been done, the great 
career, as an operative surgeon, of Kichard S. 
Kissam. .For thirty years he was one of the sur- 
gical faculty of the New York Hospital, a station 
he was solicited to accept, and displayed in his 
art resources of practical tact and original genius. 
He was emulous of surgical glory, and he obtained 
it. Our city had the honor of his birth ; ho was 
one of the sons of the renowned lawyer, Benjamin 
Kissam, who had been the legal instructor of John 
Jay. Young Kissam received a classical educa- 
tion under Cutting, of Long Island, and was 
graduated M. D. at Edinburgh in 1787. Upon 
receiving the doctorate he travelled over the con- 
tinent, and made a visit to Zimmerman, who pre- 
sented him with a copy of his work on Solitude. 
Horace and Zimmerman were the two authors 
Kissam most delighted in. His long and triumph- 
ant career leaves no possibility of doubt as to the 
solidity of his pretensions. Society had little at- 
tractions for him ; he was absorbed in his profes- 
sion. During more than twenty years he was the 
most popular operator the city could boast, and he 
was often called the man of the people. His pro- 
fessional Hberality to the afflicted poor was a strik- 
ing characteristic of his whole life ; while from the 
affluent he demanded a becoming return for his 



308 HISTORICAL DISCOUKSE. 

skill. He died in November, 1822, aged fifty-nine 
years. 

There are due, by tlie inhabitants of this me- 
tropolis, many obligations to the administration 
of the New York Hospital, for their early and in- 
cessant efforts to mitigate the horrors, and alleviate 
the sufferings of the insane. The loudest calls of 
humanity are often awakened in cases of afflicted 
intellect, and the solicitude which has frotn time 
to time invoked new desires for their reHef, has 
by this institution been crowned with results cheer- 
ing to the philanthropist. In 1808 the governors 
of the hospital erected an edifice for the exclusive 
use of the insane, on grounds adjacent to the south 
wing of their city hospital, and Dr. Archibald 
Bruce was elected as physician. In 1820 the 
large and commodious institution at Blooming- 
dale, under their government, was opened for that 
special class of patients.* This beautiful site, 
with its ample buildings, is eminently fitted for 
the benevolent design originally projected, and De 
Witt Clinton secured its perpetuity by legislative 
grants. Among the medical prescribers to this 
magnificent institution have been Hosack, Neilson, 
Bayley, Ogden, MacDonald, Phny Earle, and 
Brown. To Dr. Earle the public are obligated for 
valuable statistics and reports on mental ahen- 

* Hosack's Life of Clinton. 



BLOOMINGDALE ASYLUM. 309 

ation. When justice is done in an historical ac- 
count of the Bloomingdale Asylum, the services of 
that prominent citizen, in acts of benevolence, the 
late Thomas Eddy, will be more entirely appre- 
ciated. He seized the first opportunity to enter 
into a correspondence with Samuel Tuke, of York, 
in England, learning of the success which, under 
moral management, had followed the treatment 
of the insane ; and in Knapp's Life of Eddy are 
to be found many incidents connected with the* 
literary and professional intercourse of these two 
worthy disciples of Primitive Barclay. When 
abroad in Europe I found that the condition of 
lunatic asylums, and the treatment of those suffer- 
ing the tortures of a diseased mind, were subjects 
attracting great notice. The Keport of the Inquiry 
instituted by Parhament was then just published, 
and vast abuses exposed, and I was prompted by 
more than a vacant curiosity to add personal facts 
to my reading, by the inspection of many institu- . 
tions devoted to insanity, and the treatment adopt- 
ed by them. I dare not speak in commendation 
of the practice of Monro, at Bethlehem. I found 
mOre barbarity and indifference in the medical dis- 
cipline of those lamentable subjects of insanity in 
the establishments in Holland, than elsewhere. At 
the Bicetre, in Paris, I was delighted with the 
fatherly care and medical tact of Pinel, now the 
acknowledged discoverer of the great benefits of 



310. HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

moral management, but who, a short time before, 
was annoyed by the vituperations of the British 
press. At the retreat of Samuel Tuke, the benev- 
olent and philosoj)hic Quaker, I found all verified 
that his novel and impressive work related, and I 
was emboldened to write to Eddy, on the success 
of this important innovation on old prejudices 
which this institution presented. The result was, 
that, fortified by the most gratifying testimony, 
•the writings of Tuke and the publications of the 
day, with verbal details by intelligent travellers 
whom Eddy consulted, the moral management 
found the strongest advocates among the members 
of the Hospital Board, and demonstrative proof 
has multiplied itself again and again, that while 
the doctor's art is often indispensable to restore to 
right reason, yet that, in an imposing variety of 
cases, disturbed intellects are rendered again 
healthy, not so much by the prescription of drugs, 
as by humane treatment, and that system of man- 
agement which the Ketreat so advantageously en- 
forced. Thomas Eddy will ever be remembered 
as the active agent in this great measure in the 
New World. Pathology has not as yet yielded us 
any great light on the grave causes of mental 
aberration, and the knife of the dissector has often 
failed to trace altered structure in the most per- 
verted cases of lunacy. Hence we estimate at a 
still higher price the value of discipline, the exer- 



/ woman's hospital. 311 

cise of the kindlier affections, and moral culture. 
When the adoption of these curative measures 
shall have become more general, we shall no longer 
hear of the flagellation of an infirm monarch, or 
of ponderous manacles and eternal night as arti- 
cles of the materia medica. Our countryman 
Kush has enlarged our storehouse of facts on the 
diseases of the mind ; and the treatise of Dr. Ray, 
of Rhode Island, has strengthened our philosophy 
on the analysis of intricate cases in juridical 
science. 

With the hare mention of that newly-created 
charity, St. Luke's Hospital, now about to open 
its portals for the accommodation of the afflicted — 
an institution the offspring of Christian benevo- 
lence, aided by the outpouring liberality of our 
opulent citizens — with the further prospects we 
have before us of a Woman's Hospital, for the 
special rehef of infirmities hitherto among the 
most disconsolate of human trials, and over which 
recent science has triumphed in the hands of Dr. 
Sims : with the cherished hopes derived from the 
success of our enhghtened countryman, Dr. Howe, 
of Boston, that in due season even the forlorn idiot 
may be rescued, I reluctantly dismiss all further 
notice of the corporations of like benevolence 
which flourish in this metropolis. But it is the 
less necessary on this occasion to notice the pro- 
gress of humanity in this rapidly increasing city 



312 HISTOEICAL DISCOURSE. 

since the commencement of tlie Historical So- 
ciety's labors ; a partial estimate may be formed 
of the work that is actually done, and is doing 
among us, from the statement lately furnished by 
that accurate observer, Dr. Griscom.* 

With facts of this import before us, who will 
gainsay the claims of the divine art of healing to 
that public recognition which is yielded to the 
highest and most solemn of the professional labors 
of life ? who that properly contemplates the du- 
ties, the objects, and the desires of the real physi- 

* According to a tableau which I have compiled, says Dr. 
Griscom, chiefly from their own pubhshed statements, there are 
in this city devoted to the care of the sick poor, four general hos- 
pitals, five dispensaries, two eye and ear infirmaries, one lying-in 
asylum, three special hospitals (on Blackwell's and Randall's 
Islands), several orphan asylums and prison hospitals, besides 
other unenumerated charitable and penal establishments, where 
medical and surgical aid is rendered. In the institutions thus 
enumerated, there were treated in 1853, 151,449 cases of disease, 
of every variety. Devoted actively to the service of these pa- 
tients, we find recorded the names of 169 medical men. Esti- 
mating the professional service rendered these patients at what is 
denominated, in the last report of one of these institutions in 
true mercantile phrase, the "lowest market value" (which of ne- 
cessity varies in the several institutions, in consequence of the 
varied character of the cases) we have an aggregate of $745,458. 
An analysis of the circumstances connected with these services, 
shows that of these 169 medical men, 36 are merely boarded and 
lodged at the expense of the institutions, or receive pay equiva- 
lent thereto, amounting in all to $6,552 ; 30 of them receive 
salaries varying from $200 to $1,500, in the aggregate $20,560 ; 
while the remaining 103 receive no compensation whatever. In 



MEDICAL ADVANCEMENT. 313 

cian, can prove reluctant in awarding to liis re- 
sponsible calling merits not surpassed by those of 
any other human avocation ? Let the moralist 
and the philosopher give attention to the j)rogress 
medical science has made during a period not 
longer than that of an ordinary human life ; in- 
vestigate the achievements which have marked the 
past thirty years ; learn in. how many ways pesti- 
lence has been disarmed of half of her weapons ; 
individual disorders lessened in malignity or exter- 
timated ; hygiene fortified with new capabilities ; 
the principles of sanitary laws comprehended and 
applied ; individual life made happier and pro- 
longed ; the health of mighty populations im- 
proved, and the great numerical increase in lon- 
gevity. London is at the present day to be 
enumerated as first of the healthiest cities in the 
world ; and the statistics which have been given 

addition to this, if we estimate the amount of private gratuitous 
advice which every medical man renders, in the emergencies of 
the sick poor, at the moderate rate of $100 per annum, the num- 
ber of practitioners in this city being about 900. we have a total 
sum of $90,000 to add to that before given, making a total of ser- 
vices rendered by the medical profession, in the year 1853, to the 
sick poor, in the city of New York, of $835,458, of which there 
is returned $27,112." In whatever light it may be viewed, the 
rendition of these services is simply the contribution of the medi- 
cal profession to the support of public charity, to the full amount 
mentioned ; it is so much saved to the tax-payers. — Anniversary 
Discourse before the JSfeio York Academy of Medicine, Nov. 22d, 
1854, by John H. Griscom, M. D. 
14 



314 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

to the public by our distinguished countryman, Dr. 
Campbell F. Stewart,* show us the grounds upon 
which life annuities may be granted to the greater 
advantage of the insurer, a ratio of improvement 
which Price, Morgan, and Finlaison, never antici- 
pated. In another work previously published, of 
elaborate exposition, and pregnant with instructive 
facts relative to vital s-tatistics and hospitals, by 
the gentleman to whom I have just alluded, the 
able Dr. Stewart, we are furnished with still more 
striking views of the enlarged science compre- 
hended in the medical art, of the wide benevolence 
exercised by the French government for the pro- 
motion of healing knowledge and the deep inter- 
ests of humanity. " While affording a judicious 
and parental care to all its poor subjects," says Dr. 
Stewart, ^' it is towards the sick and infirm, how- 
ever, that the most benevolent attentions have 
been extended by the government, in establishing 
for their accommodation, and particularly for those 
of the capital, the most extensive and best organ- 
ized hospitals and houses of refuge that are to be 
met with anywhere in the world/'f 

The intimate connection between the healing 
art and religious sentiment is obvious throughout 
the history of both ; the charities of the Komish, 

* Discoure before the New York Academy of Medicine, 
f The Hospitals and Surgeons of Paris. By F. Campbell 
Stewart, M. D, New York : 8vo, 1843. 



REV. E. M. P. WELLS. 315 

and tlie humane enterprises of the Protestant 
Church, are identified with the divine system of 
faith, whose holy Author was sanctioned to the 
popular heart by miraculous healing. At the 
commencement of my professional career, and 
while yet a student, it was not uncommon to hear 
breathed over the process of vaccination a special 
form of prayer, invoking a blessing on this re- 
medial experiment, and thereby exorcising the 
bitter animosity of its pertinacious opponents. In 
our own day this pious union of religious exercises 
with medical charities takes a broader range ; most 
of our hospitals and asylums enjoy the minis- 
trations of a chaplain, as in the case of the be- 
nign guardian of St. Stephen's House at Boston, 
that modern apostle with whom Paul would have 
loved to fraternize, the Eev. Dr. Wells. The 
exact period at which provision was made for such 
spiritual consolation for the afilicted in various in- 
stitutions of the States, I am unable to record. 
Pastoral duties and religious instruction seem to 
have been first regularly imparted in the charitable 
organizations of New York in 1810. They have 
become an integrant portion of the adjuvants to 
the afilicted ; and perhaps no official of this paro- 
chial function has ever longer or more faithfully dis- 
charged that responsible trust than John Stanford, 
D. D., the lately deceased chaplain of the New 
York Hospital. 



316 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

How much then has been accomplished by the 
mental activity, the science, and the philanthropy 
of the medical faculty ? Had now this opulent 
city a proper sanitary commission duly organized, 
with our almost unequalled topograj)hical advan- 
tages, we might boast of a population whose mor- 
tality might safely be estimated at twenty-five or 
thirty per cent, less than is recorded of its present 
inhabitants. Sad, sad indeed, is the reflection, 
that responsible trusts are not always confided to 
competent officials. The trammels of party too 
often defeat the best designs, and incompetency 
usurps the seat of knowledge. How long we are to 
be doomed to witness this monstrous incongruity 
and "suffer its penalties, time alone must show. 

In taking a retrospective view of the progress 
of medical science during the past fifty or sixty 
years in New York, the instructors and practition- 
ers of the healing art have had many reasons for 
rejoicing. Our medical colleges have enhanced in 
power, and the means of enlightenment. "••'•" The 
collateral branches of science are unfolded by more 
ample apparatus, and by experiments such as in 
former days were wholly beyond our reach. Our 

* Now three in number : — The College of Physicians and 
Surgeons, founded in ISOY, its present head, Dr. Cock ; the Uni- 
versity of the City of New York, founded in 1840, present head, 
Dr. Draper ; and the New York Medical College, founded in 1848, 
present head, Dr. Greene. 



MEDICAL SCIENCE. 317 

medical annals are enriched' with recorded evi- 
dences of great chirurgical skiUj of novel and suc- 
cessful proofs of wise discrimination, and of genius 
happily demonstrated ; in the j)ractical displays 
of clinical science, the writings of our authors 
have furnished lessons of instruction to the masters 
of the art abroad. Our medical and scientific 
literature is sought after with becoming deference 
by remote professors in foreign schools, and has the 
honor of translation for continental Europe. All 
this for a long season has been gratifying to indi- 
vidual pride, and flattering to our character as a 
rising people. Yet it is not to be concealed that 
imposture still holds its influence among us, and 
that, as a learned body, the medical profession is 
still disfigured by pretenders to its secrets ; that 
jarring elements still disturb its harmony, and that 
the public, scarcely to be presumed to be the best 
judges of the recondite qualifications of the disci- 
ples of heahng, are still molested by the artifices 
of the designing and the effrontery of the igno- 
rant. 

More than forty years ago I gave utterance to 
my opinion on the condition of the medical art in 
New York.* The reasons for denunciation of 

* " That almost every district of our country abounds with 
individuals who set up to exercise the duties of practitioners of 
medicine, need scarcely be stated ; how great is the number of 
them, who from want of proper education and from habits of in- 



318 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

many occurrences then prevalent, were stronger 
than at the present day. The condition of affairs 
is ameliorated. Numerous agencies have been in 
operation since that period, which have corrected 
many abuses detrimental to public safety. Then 
we could not speak of a school of Pharmacy. The 
Indian doctors and the effete remnant of licentiates 
by a justice's court, thanks to a superintending 
Providence, now rest from their labors. Collegiate 
knowledge is more widely diffused, and he is an 
adventurous individual who now presumes to ap- 
proach the bedside without the clinical knowledge 
of hospitals. I shall never forget the tone of 

dolence, are totally ignorant of the first principles of their pro- 
fession, and who degrade the noblest of studies into the meanest 
of arts, cannot have escaped the attention of any who at all re- 
gard the interests of society. That characters of this description 
do abound, not in this or that particular city or district, but are 
to be met with in almost every part of the country, is a fact which 
no one, we presume, will have the hardihood to deny. Though 
they differ from beasts of prey, inasmuch as these are most gen- 
erally found in the uninhabited wilds of the country, while those 
are most abundantly congregated in our largest and most popu- 
lous cities, yet they wage war with equal success as it regards the 
destruction of their objects. So frequently, indeed, do they pre- 
sent themselves to our view as almost to have become domesti- 
cated and familiar with us, and to have lost that novelty which 
monsters in general possess. The inroads and depredations which 
they commit, bid defiance to all calculation ; whether they come 
in the natural shape of nostrum-mongers and venders of infallible 
cures, or whether they assume a peculiar grimace and affected 
sapience, their touch is equally pestilential." — American Medical 
and Philosophical RegisteVy vol. iii. 



MEDICAL SCIENCE. 319 

voice, the elocution which I heard proceed from 
the mouth of John Abernethy, when he told the 
boys (for he called all by that designation, though 
some were sixty years old), that they must judge 
for themselves of the truth of what he uttered by 
what they derived from hospital practice. " I was 
the first," said he, " who described fungous h^ema- 
todes ; I have seen as yet but three cases, but the 
disease is distinctive, well marked, and cannot be 
mistaken by the cKnical eye ; yet," added he, "I 
meet practioners now and then, who tell me they 
have had twenty cases. No de23endence can be 
placed upon such observers. If they would but 
visit St. Thomas, I could convince them of their 
error, and expose their ignorance. These pests of 
the profession have no clinical experience, and 
magnify their stupidity by falsehood. Boys, the 
hospital is the college to build up the practitioner." 
If I were placed here to defend or advance the 
importance of bedside knowledge, I might cut the 
argument very short, by requesting the young dis- 
ciples of ^sculapius to sift the merits of the once 
great work of Cullen, the First Lines, and then read 
the Practice of Physic by Watson, of this our day : 
he would then be able to pronounce by which 
teacher he becomes best disciphned to fulfil the 
grave duties of hcahng the sick. I am not to 
overlook what the contributions of half a century 
have made to the noble science, and of which the 



320 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

illustrious Cullen could scarcely have possessed a 
glimpse ; but the theories of the one, and the 
clinical data of the other, may be looked at with 
scrutinizing judgment, to determine the inherent 
merits of refined theory, and that sjDecial wisdom 
on which the practical physician relies. It may 
be written as an axiom. You might as well create 
a practical navigator by residence in a sylvan 
retreat, as furnish a physician without hospital 
experience. 

Nevertheless, it would be criminal to ignore the 
fact that the noble art with us still struggles with 
many difficulties ; and it is a glaring truth, that not 
the least of them has arisen in the vicissitudes of leg- 
islation. The few wholesome laws, which a century 
had brought forth, for the advancement of medi- 
cine and the protection of its rights, were by State 
authority, some ten or twelve years since, abro- 
gated, and, strange to add, the bill which -accom- 
pHshed that nefarious measure was introduced into 
the chamber of the Senate by a partisan repre- 
sentative from this city. The distinguished presi- 
dent of our Historical Society, Lieut. Gov. Bradish, 
was then a member of the Senate. It is scarcely 
necessary to add that his cultivated mind recoiled 
at the measure, and that his strenuous efibrts were 
exerted to defeat the iniquitous law. There was 
no monopoly existing to absorb the rights of others 
that could justify such enactment. The colleges 



PERNICIOUS LEGISLATION. 321 

did no more than confer their usual honors, to dis- 
tinguish and reward merit ; they fostered rising 
talent, and held communion with mature expe- 
rience, with no other aim than to exalt excellence ; 
their very incorporation forbade their countenance 
of corrupt practices ; and with the principles ever 
inherent in disciplined minds, they disdained to 
mar the rank of professional worth. I have often 
had my creduKty taxed to believe that in these 
enlightened days such hardihood could have been 
exhibited by the makers of our laws, and that too 
at the very seat of wisdom, where our special 
guardians of literature and science, the Hon. the 
Kegents of the University, annually convene, and 
where, moreover, that long created association, the 
State Medical Society, with its many able mem- 
bers, are wont to exercise their chartered privi- 
leges for medical improvement. 

It is almost superfluous to remark that the 
memorable act to which I have alluded was re- 
ceived by the Profession with emotions of sorrow 
and indignation. It was now seen that the noble 
art was again left unprotected by the representa- 
tives of the people, and consequently by the peo- 
ple themselves. It had thus found itself in the 
beginning of the city, but a revolving century had 
presented some relief; its prospects had bright- 
ened, and the rights and immunities of the regular 
physician had been recognized, and approved laws 
14* 



S22 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

had secured him against the tricks of the harlequin 
and the wiles of the over-reaching. The disci- 
plined medical man is not, however, the easiest to 
be disheartened. His study is human nature, and 
he comprehends its phases : 

Intus et in cute novi. 

He is familiar with hindrances, and in the exercise 
of his art has often prescribed for individual men- 
tal delusion, and can comprehend the sources of 
popular error. What is sporadic he knows may 
become epidemic. 

The medical faculty, accordingly, now took a 
new view of the interests of their profession and 
the safety of the people. Their determination 
was fixed, that no degeneracy in that science to 
which their lives were devoted should follow as a 
consequence of pernicious legislation. Notwith- 
standing all restrictions of quahfications for the 
exercise of the art might be considered as removed, 
lyet the city was not to be dismayed by absurd 
enactments, or the profession alarmed because 
the door was opened so wide that all who chose 
might enter into practice ; a broader privilege than 
is enjoyed, I believe, by any of the members of the 
mechanical fraternity. Other circumstances not 
now necessary to be enumerated strengthened their 
designs, and favored their deliberations, and there 
was no reason for delay. The auspicious hour had 



ACADEMY OF MEDICINE. 323 

at length arrived, and the formation of an Acad- 
emy of Medicine in this city was secured. This 
timely, this judicious, this important, this neces- 
sary movement, owed its creation to the wants and 
honor of the profession, and the perpetuity of its 
rights. Association, it was reasoned, would pro- 
tect its claims as the noblest of pursuits, and its 
divine origin could not be abrogated by the statute 
book. The year 1846 gave birth to the Academy ; 
its incorporation was granted in 1852. I cannot 
now write the history of this successful institution 
during its first decennial. Our Nestors in Hip- 
pocratic science, moved by weighty reasons in be- 
half of public health and individual happiness, 
laid its foundation, and in this goodly work we find 
recorded the names of Stevens, Mott, Smith, Stew- 
art, Wood, Reese, Kissam, Detmold, Gardner, and 
Stearns. 

The Academy has been generously fostered by 
an imposing number of the erudite and accom- 
plished of the medical and surgical profession, and 
order and harmony have characterized all its pro- 
ceedings. The subject matter of discussion at its 
meetings, and the communications of its members, 
have had special interest, and have demonstrated 
that the faculty of close observation and acute rea- 
soning is still among the diagnostic marks of the 
cultivated practical physician. Its printed trans- 
actions speak in louder accents of the excellence 



324 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

of its labors than my feeble pen can here express. It 
has contributed largely to the diffusion of the great 
principles on sanitary laws, medicine, police, and 
other grave matters in which the public health is 
deeply involved. It has awakened new interest on 
other subjects sadly overlooked, medical topography 
and topics of special and immediate consequence to 
the framers of our municipal laws, and while thus 
engaged it has with philosophical gratification dis- 
dained not to encourage erudite inquiries into the 
condition and progress of the Di^dne art among its 
earhest cultivators ; thus dignifying the requisites 
of modern knowledge with the love of antiquarian 
lore, and with true devotion to the past announced 
its verdict in behalf of that wisdom which the 
pregnant pages of the History of Ancient Medicine 
has unfolded for our contemplation and delight, by 
our learned associate Dr. John Watson.'*' . With 
an inflexible intent to keep a watchful eye over 
the interests of professional learning and practical 
skill, to hold in reverential regard the obligations 
of sound medical ethics, to guard against the de- 
lusions and the medical heresies of the day, and at 
all times to cherish the rising merits of the junior 
associates in the art of healing, no ajjprehension 
need be felt that the Academy will prove other- 
wise than a rich boon to medical philosophy, and 

* The Medical Profession of Ancient Times. New York : 
8vo. 1856. 



JOHN STEARNS. 325 

a blessing to this great, prosperous, and vastly in- 
creasing metropolis. 

Like the Historical Society, the Academy of 
Medicine selected at its organization a venerable 
head as its first President, John Stearns. He 
had fulness of years, weight of character, and cor- 
responding exjDerience, and could look back with 
satisfaction on an extensive career of professional 
service. He was a native of Massachusetts, and 
born in 1770. He was graduated in the arts at 
Yale College in 1786. He attended the lectures 
of Kush, Shippen, Kuhn, and others of Philadel- 
phia, but did not receive the doctorate until 1812, 
when the Kegents of the University of New York 
conferred on him the honorary degree of M. D. 
He commenced the practical exercise of his pro- 
fession at Waterford, afterwards at Albany and at 
Saratoga, and finally settled in the city of New 
York, where he maintained the reputation of an 
honorable, devoted, and benevolent physician, iintil 
the close of his long life, in March, 1848. His 
death, which was greatly lamented, was occasioned 
by a dissection wound, arising from his zeal to ar- 
rive, by a post-mortem examination, at more cer- 
tain pathological conclusions, in a case of singular 
interest. He met this unexpected disaster with 
exemplary forbearance, and experienced the conso- 
lation of a Christian's hope in his final departure. 
The Academy paid appropriate funeral honors to 



326 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

his memory, and the Kev. Dr. Tyng, of St. George's 
Chapel, of which Dr. Stearns' had long heen a 
member, delivered an appropriate discourse on the 
life and character of the " Good Physician." 

Great as was the devotion paid by Dr. Stearns 
to practical medicine, he was in earlier life enlisted 
in political affairs ; and we find him in the Senate 
of the State of New York in 1812, and a member 
of the Council of Appointment. Shortly after the 
organization of the State Medical Society, he de- 
livered the annual address, as President. He was 
for many years a Trustee of the College of Phy- 
sicians and Surgeons. His name is recorded as 
one of the founders of the American Tract So- 
ciety, and he took a deep interest in the welfare of 
the Bible Society, and the Institution for the 
benefit of the Deaf and Dumb. The annals of 
charity include his name in other institutions of a 
benevolent design. His philanthropic spirit cannot 
be questioned. His writings on the profession, 
and on subjects of a kindred nature, are scattered 
through the periodicals of the times. He is indis- 
solubly associated with an heroic article of the 
materia medica, the virtues of which tiis clinical 
sagacity first brought to notice. His brief paper 
on Catalepsy attracted the attention of the learned 
Dr. Good. This short sketch must suffice to show 
that the Academy were judicious in the choice of 
their first officer, and both his inaugural address 



VALENTINE MOTT. 327 

and the manner in which he fulfilled his trust, 
soon dismissed all doubt as to the wisdom of their 
suffrage. This venerable man gave dignity to the 
meetings ; his courteousness secured deference and 
maintained authority ; his knowledge and his im- 
partiality added fairness to debate, and increased 
the gratification of intellectual association. 

The office of President is filled by annual elec- 
tions. The present head of the Academy is 
Valentine Mott, whose zeal and assiduity in behalf 
of the great interests of medical and surgical 
science, half a century's labors testify. The lustre 
of his great name seems to have still further 
swelled the number of friends to the Academy, 
and excited additional activity among them to 
promote the expressed designs of its incorporation. 

At the commencement of this address I briefly 
recorded some of the more striking changes which 
had modified the topographical aspect of the sur- 
face of New York. Dr. King, in his " Progress 
of the City," had noticed others, and still addi- 
tional facts and illustrations were recently given 
by General Dix, in his public lecture on the 
Growth, Destinies, and Duties of New York : to 
these tracts I must refer the curious inquirer. In 
the astonishing march of improvemejit no physical 
obstacle has proved insuperable to the designs of 
the projectors, and no expense, however great, has 
been withheld. It has been said, perhaps too 



328 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

figurativelyj tliat the whole island has been in 
the shovel^ either to cut down or fill up the 
surface. Assuredly posterity will never form a 
true conception of the alterations which have 
been made on the site of New York, and the 
onus of taxation which has been borne by the 
past generation or two. But all seems justifiable 
by the growth, the wealth, and the increased 
resources of the metropolis. Here, however, I 
make a pause, and as an episode to the medical 
section of this discourse, subjoin a few observations 
derived from those very changes which have over- 
turned the physical aspect of the city, and pene- 
trated even the sanctuaries of the dead. The 
facts brought to light by the opening of church- 
yards and the removal of the dead to other places 
of interment, that I have witnessed, during the 
last half century, have been many. Graveyards, 
" those populous cities of the dead," as Mr. King 
remarks, ^' have not been sacred from the hand of 
improvement or the foot of 23rogress.'' Hence the 
disinterring human remains has taken place in this 
city to a great extent, and the knowledge thus 
obtained, as it was ample and direct, has furnished 
many curious facts on the subject of human de- 
composition after death. I may have taken more 
than ordinary interest in this matter, inasmuch as 
it was a legitimate subject for discussion in medical 
jurisprudence, and I have passed no little portion 



CHURCH VAULTS. 329 

of time in observation when these sepulchral tene- 
ments were dislodged. Every reader is acquainted 
with the long durability of bone not subjected to 
corroding causes ; but I have arrived at the conclu- 
sion that the diversified forms which the decay of 
the human body after death assumes, are no less 
numerous than the immense variety of causes by 
which life becomes extinct. The evidence of this 
assertion may be witnessed by any one who will 
enter a vault containing many bodies, deposited 
therein at different periods more or less remote, 
and observe the materials with which he is sur- 
rounded : season, age, the character of the disease, 
protracted illness, sudden death, as by lightning or 
other accident, &c., will all exercise a greater or 
less influence in facilitating or retarding' decom- 
position. The decayed subject by marasmus will 
longer retain its constituents than one occasioned 
by dropsy, for ^^ water is a sore decay er of the dead 
body." If these positions be correct, we may in 
part account for the extraordinary preservation of 
bodies in Hmestone, or marble cemeteries ; they 
possess advantages which are denied to vaults of 
brick, or those in the structure of which proper 
precautions have not been observed, as a dry or 
gravelly soil, &c. In reflecting upon the manner 
in which marble seems to cherish the lineaments 
of our mortal remains, one feels inclined to adopt 
the language of old Jeremy Taylor, "after all, 



330 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

our vaults are our longest and sincerest mourn- 



ers."* 



When I subjected to manipulation the neglected 
philosopher, old Christopher Colles,f the more ad- 
vantageously to present him to the public view, I 
partially brought forward some occurrences which 
marked the Hterary condition of our metropohs. 
I design at present to enter a little more minutely 
into some circumstances associated with the ad- 
vancement of knowledge in this city, particularly 
as connected with the time somewhat anterior to 
the establishment of the New York Historical So- 
ciety, and then to notice a few prominent events 
of more recent date, which seem calculated to give 
confidence to the friends of intellectual rank, that 
the march of mind is a certain fact, and that we 
may look on with admiration at the achievements 
that have been already wrought, rather than 
cherish any despondency for the future. The 
trifling incidents with which I commence these 
literary memorials possess an -intrinsic interest, in- 
asmuch as they are decisive of the humble state 
and embarrassments in which instruction and 
knowledge generally were involved, and of the 
feeble powers which the Press, only two or three 
generations ago, sustained in this country. They 

* See Guy's Medical Jurisprudence ; edited by Dr. Lee. 
t Knickerbocker Gallery. New York : 8vo. 1855. 



STATE OF PRINTING. 331 

are a suitable prelude to the great drama now 
enacting. 

Southey has said that an American's first play- 
thing is the rattlesnake's tail ; and as he grows up 
he lays traps for opossums and shoots squirrels for 
his breakfast. This exaggeration may possibly 
have had a shadow of truth in it at the time when 
the pilgrim fathers established their first printing 
presSj or when Bradford first published our laws, 
or even when the flying coach travelled once a 
week between New York and Philadelphia. An 
impartial examination of facts will generally lead 
to the conviction that elementary education for the 
most part accompanies the progress of population, 
and that the requirements of information are pro- 
portionably furnished. From her very commence- 
ment, it has seemed to me that New York has 
been characterized more by her scientific displays 
than by her literary products. The distinction 
which has been awarded her eminent men who 
have labored in the several liberal professions of 
law, physic, and divinity, would appear to justify 
the observation. Be this as it may, we have no 
difiiculty in accounting for the absence of learning 
in our earlier days, when we contemplate the con- 
dition of the people at difierent epochs in their 
country's history, and weigh the force of circum- 
stances : as for example, that in some instances 
where the Declaration of Independence being read 



332 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

at the head of military detachments^ and then 
ordered to be printed for wider distribution, types 
could not be found to execute the work. Indeed a 
like difficulty, that of possessing types, was expe- 
rienced when it was contemplated to publish the 
first American edition of the English Bible, at 
Philadelphia, by K. Aitken. The unsettled state 
of the country, and the horrors of warfare, caused 
the pious design to be protracted from its incep- 
tion in 1777 to 1782, when the sacred volume ap- 
peared in small duodecimo and in brevier type. 

At the date at which I would commence these 
reminiscences, the old Daily Advertiser, and Mc- 
Lean's New York Gazette, were the leading ora- 
cles. The former, it is curious to observe, was 
printed with the press and types which had been 
used by Franklin in Philadeli3hia, and which, I 
am told. Poor Kichard disposed of advantageously 
to Francis Childs, of New York. For mercantile 
purposes these papers did well, and had a corre- 
sponding circulation ; they betokened in part the 
state of mental culture among the masses. If, 
however, we except the discussions on the Ameri- 
can Constitution by the writers of the Federalist, 
and some few other subjects of national impor- 
tance, by Kufus King, Noah Webster, Fisher 
Ames, and a few others, we may affirm that a 
single issue of some of our most popular papers 
of the present day, is enriched with more intel- 



THE NEWSPAPER PRESS. 333 

lectual material than a year's file of these old 
journals. In 1793 was projected the Minerva, 
which under the control of its editor, Noah Web- 
ster, at once elevated the character of this species 
of periodical literature. Webster labored at this 
service some seven years, when the title of the 
paper was changed to that of the Commercial 
Advertiser, which has continued its diurnal course 
up to the present time, under the supervision of 
Francis H. Hall, and has attained a longevity 
greater than that of any other journal ever orig- 
inated in this city. Among its memorable editors 
was the late W. L. Stone, a devoted man to his 
responsible trust, of great fidelity in his political 
views. It can boast of a succession of editors re- 
markable for their freedom from violent political 
aspersion, of extreme jealousy in behalf of moral 
and religious instruction, and strong attachment 
to American institutions. Lewis, who succeeded 
Webster, had been reared a divine, and was hardly 
adapted to encounter the antagonistic assaults of 
the party press ; Col. Stone, equal to his prede- 
cessor in refinement of feeling and charitable im- 
pulse, with stronger devotion and greater industry, 
filled the measure of his renown by a perseverance 
in patriotism and benevolence that won the ad- 
miration of numerous patrons. To his daily toil 
he superadded other responsible labors, and wrote 
the life of Brant, of Red Jacket, on the Canal 



334 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

policy of the State, The Uncas, Wyoming, and 
other volumes of an historical design, besides sev- 
eral papers for our Association. 

Samuel Loudon, who arrived among us about 
1775, though stated by Thomas, in his history of 
Printing, as an Irishman, was born in Scotland. 
He published a newspaper in New York in 1776, 
before the British took possession of the city, upon 
which event he retired to Fishkill, on the Hudson, 
where he issued the New York Packet, and be- 
came a printer to the convention which was held 
at Kingston. He was ardent in the American 
cause, and adventurous in his career. He was for 
a time associated with Greenleaf in the publication 
of the Argus, a journal of extreme political vio- 
lence and anti-federal in politics. Upon the death 
of Greenleaf, by yellow fever in 1798, the Argus 
became the American Citizen, under the editorial 
government of James Cheetham, a writer caustic 
and defiant, of surpassing rigor, and of untram- 
melled license, and whose remarkable death in 
1810 I have on a former occasion recorded.* Lou- 
don's devotion to the country of his adoption was 
patriotic indeed, but the sjDirit of sectional con- 
tention marred his fiscal prospects. I have repeat- 
edly seen the old man, now advancing to his four- 
score years, grave, gray, and infirm, perambulating 

* Griswold'a International Magazine, vol, 5. 



CHEETHAM. — COLEMAN. 335 

the public walks, unobserved of even observers, 
himself indifferent to all but his own inward cogi- 
tations. He was in 1785 an active member of the 
St. Andrew's Society, and an elder of the Scotch 
Kirk of old Dr. Mason. 

In this enumeration of the prominent political 
journals which preceded the formation of the His- 
torical Society, I shall say a few words on the New 
York Evening Post. It was projected at the com- 
mencement of the Jefferson administration, and 
could justly boast of its lofty parentage, Hamil- 
ton and Wells being among the most conspicuous 
of its able writers. WiUiam Coleman, an eastern 
man, in the prime of his faculties assumed the 
editorship, and labored in his vocation until the 
period of his death in 1829, aged 63 years. The 
literary tact of this gazette was a striking feature 
in its columns ; its poKtical acrimony was scarcely 
inferior to that of the American Citizen, and while 
Cheetham was its rival, an almost continuous war- 
fare was maintained between an enlarged democ- 
racy and the conservative doctrines of federalism. 
Victory on either side was often sought with little 
scruples touching the validity of facts. The physical 
organizations of the two men were not bad repre- 
sentatives of their mental attributes. Cheetham 
was some years younger than Coleman, but of 
robust form, larger frame, and greater height. An 
English radical, escaped from the Manchester riots 



336 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

of 1798, lie became the principal of an already- 
radical press, and promulgated with little circum- 
spection the strongest doctrines in behalf of the 
widest democracy. He had largely cultivated his 
mind by choice historical reading, and the poets ; 
he was remarkable for the personalities of his in- 
vective, and often with a delicious richness recalled 
to memory the style of Junius. Coleman, of deh- 
cate structure and often in feeble health, was less 
personal in his general spirit and expression, yet 
far from being deficient in pointed epithets and 
lacerating remarks. Cheetham was sententious ; 
Coleman often verbose. Cheetham might fell you 
at a blow ; Coleman's greater delight was in pro- 
tracted torture. There was more of policy and 
prudence in the latter. Then- satisfaction at the 
prostration of their victims might be equally great. 
These editors seemed to live antagonistically. 
Cheetham might present himself in the public 
ways with the bold face and majestic bearing of a 
great captain ; Coleman might be observed on like 
occasions, with the grave countenance and pensive 
look of a thoughtful student. Cheetham might 
have thrown off his literary missiles at a Table 
d'Hote or from the head of a drum ; Coleman 
profited best in the sequestered hbrary. Cheet- 
ham's salutation might be a grasp of the hand 
that made your very knuckles ache, while with 
Coleman your arm might incautiously fall down 



CHEETHAM. COLEMAN. 337 

by your side. Cheetham wore a presumptuous 
front, Coleman betrayed a sinister leer ; Cheet- 
ham would readily forgive, Coleman long har- 
bored an imagined injury ; Cheetham made bare 
his strength, and gloried in encountering difficul- 
ties ; Coleman found it more congenial to under- 
mine and lay waste. The temperaments of the 
two men are pretty well manifested in the stric- 
tures of Cheetham on John Wood's history of the 
Administration of John Adams, and in Coleman's 
prolonged disquisitions on Jefferson's Message. 
Cheetham united with ample lungs in the pa- 
triotic bravura with General Gates and his other 
friends, while Coleman, more attuned to melodious 
strains, calmly yielded a benignant ear to the 
welcome notes of a pensive falsetto. Coleman 
might at times be soothed by a sonnet on the 
affections ; Cheetham demanded a chapter of 
Bolingbroke. They were both men of personal 
prowess and confident aims ; both were duellists, 
but that was at a period when duelling was a 
fashionable recreation. The idols of Cheetham 
were Jefferson and George Clinton ; the idols of 
Coleman were Hamilton and Timothy Pickering. 
Burr had no chance with either ; he was offensive 
to both, though countenanced by the Morning 
Chronicle, and sustained by the mollifying appli- 
ances of the resolute William P. Van Ness. I 
may say I was fairly acquainted with these two 
15 



338 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

able editors ; I occasionally attended them pro- 
fessionally with my preceptor, Dr. Hosack, and was 
often occupied with them in common business 
aifairs. But I am constrained to affirm that the 
characters I have given them are mainly drawn 
from transactions associated with their political 
vocation. They Vere assuredly men of personal 
courage, of warm temperaments, of keen suscep- 
tibilities, but more or less transformed or deformed 
by the crafty art of the staid politician ; for the rot- 
tenness of party dogmas during the career of the 
philosophic Jefferson was doubtless as great as in 
this our own day. At the calamities of others they 
could sorrow and weep as members of the household 
of humanity. I have witnessed Cheetham, half a 
mile from his residence, expending his best energies 
at midnight to extinguish the flames of the humble 
residence of a common citizen, and Coleman pour 
out tears at the grievances of the wearied printer 
boy. With all their faults, they diffused much 
truth as well as error ; they advanced the power 
of the press in talents, and in improved knowledge ; 
they aided the progress of literary culture ; there- 
fore I have made this brief record of them. The 
Post has survived its half century, and still lives 
in more than its pristine vigor. Both editors were 
friendly to the Historical Society. 

The New York Magazine, projected by the 
Swords, was the only monthly periodical that re- 



EARLY MAGAZINES. 339 

ceived a becoming patronage, wliicli sustained it 
for some eight or nine years, when it was succeeded 
"by the American Magazine and the New York 
Eeview, whose writers were not unfrequently called 
the Mohawk Keviewers, from their hostility to the 
rising Jacobinism of the times. The period of the 
existence of these periodicals was from 1790 to 
1801. The first specified was the chosen vehicle 
for a series of essays of a literary circle, called the 
Drone Club. This association, as I have already 
stated, included many accomplished writers, as 
Mitchill, Kent, &c. The last survivor of the Drones 
was the late Chief Justice Samuel Jones, an early 
member of the Historical Society and a prodigy 
in black-letter learning. He died in 1853, aged 
80 years. In 1797 the Medical Kepository was 
commenced by Drs. Mitchill, Miller and Smith, 
the first journal of a scientific character the coun- 
try could boast. The business of instruction in 
our preparatory schools was, with few exceptions, 
under the control of inadequate principals ; in 
many instances the commonest business of life was 
abandoned on the demand for a teacher, and the 
responsible duties of an intellectual guide, under- 
taken by individuals whose chief recommendation 
was their dexterity with the awl and the hammer. 
Some "qualified for the great trust, were, however, 
found. Edward Riggs, long the master of a 
grammar school in this city, published his Intro- 



340 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

duction to the Latin Tongue in 1784, the first in- 
digenous work of that kind among us. He may 
be considered our Ezekiel Cheever.' Eiggs was 
followed by James Hardy, the compiler of several 
compends for instruction in the classics, in 1793— '4. 
The remembrance of him is still vivid. He was 
an Aberdeen scholar ; his early hfe was devoted to 
the seas ; he became an inmate of the family of 
Dr. Beattie, who gave him recommendations as 
well qualified for a professorship of clas^cal liter- 
ature. At Dr. Beattie's suggestion he came out 
to this city. In his best estate he was an approved 
teacher. After a while he abandoned the school- 
master's ofiice, and finally sought a livelihood as a 
supernumerary of the Board of Health. He en- 
countered the yellow fever in its most malignant 
form with consummate bravery during its several 
visitations after 1795, and compiled those volumes 
of facts and opinions on the pestilence which bear 
his name. He lived through many vicissitudes, 
and died in great indigence, of cholera, in 1832. 

The elementary spelling books of Webster, and 
the geography of Morse, in my urchin days, were 
making their way to public approbation, not how- 
ever without much oj)position ; they had a long 
contest with Dilworth and Salmon, and almost a 
score of years had passed before Pike andRoot, 
authorities with the federal currency, overcame the 
schoolmaster's assistant and the Irishman Gough, 



AMERICAN LITERATURE. 341 

with their sterling standard value of pounds, 
shillings, and pence. The success of these under- 
takings of Webster and Morse is to be classed 
among the wonders in literary history ; the period 
of their appearance was most opportune, and the 
public demand has caused the multiplication of 
editions that for a long series of years may have 
amounted in the aggregate to upwards of a million 
of copies annually. Such is indeed the fact with 
the elementary book of Webster, and the geography 
of Morse for a long while maintained a universal 
popularity. It is not saying too much that these 
books were great boons for the advancement of 
popular knowledge. As we advance a little fur- 
ther we find that Enfield's Speaker was forced to 
yield to Bingham's Preceptor, and D wight's Co- 
lumbia superseded Kule Britannia. I cannot 
dwell on the speculations thrown out by the 
teachers of the day on the merits and demerits of 
these instruments of their art, and on the necessity 
then urged by them, of a disenthralled and free 
nation exercising an independent judgment, with 
the patriotic endeavor to create a new literature 
for a regenerated people. With respect to books 
of practical science the same spirit was manifested, 
till at length we find at the commencement of this 
century, the New Practical Navigator of Nathaniel 
Bowditch, of Boston, securing its triumphs for 
every sea, over the time-honored Practical Navi- 



342 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

gator of Hamilton Moore, of Tower-liill, London. 
It is a fact of curious import that the eminent jurist, 
Theophilus Parsons, was the editor of the first 
American edition of the Practical Navigator, pub- 
lished by E. Blunt, the renowned projector of 
many works on coast surveys and nautical affairs. 
This desire for fresh mental aliment under a 
new constitution was by no means limited ; it 
spread far and wide, jmrticularly in New England ; 
it left, I believe, old Euclid unmolested, but it in- 
volved equally the infant primer and the elaborate 
treatise. In the colonial condition of affairs Stern- 
hold and Hopkins had sustained many assaults, 
but their strongholds were now invaded by the 
popular zeal of Barlow and Dwight. Nor were 
these innovations confined to sacred poetry alone. 
The psalmody which had for almost centuries mol- 
lified the distresses of the heart, and elevated the 
drooping spirits of the devout, surrendered its 
wonted claims to the Columbian Harmonist of 
Read. A tolerable library might be formed of the 
various productions of these operatives in the busi- 
ness of popular instruction. Noah Webster had 
engendered this zeal more perhaps than any other 
individual, and by incessant devotion had kept it 
alive. His Dissertations on the English Language 
he sent to Franklin, and Franklin in return wrote 
to Webster that his book would be useful in turn- 
ing the thoughts of his countrymen to correct 



AMERICAN LITERATURE. 343 

writing, yet administered to him profitable cau- 
tions. But literature, like the free soil of the 
country in these days, was infested with many 
weeds, and words ran high on many points of ver- 
bal logic. Amidst all these commotions some 
things were deemed too sacred on all sides to be 
molested. Such was the affecting history of the 
martyrdom of John Eodgers, burnt at Smithfield ; 
but the nursery rhyme. 

Whales in the sea — God's voice obey, 

by acclamation was transformed info another 
equally undeniable truth : 

By Washington — Great deeds were done. 

A truth moreover which came home immediately 
to the feeHngs of the American bosom, and cleaved 
perhaps nearer the heart. 

While the English language therefore, in the 
hands of the disciplinarians, was struggling for 
new powers and a loftier phraseology, — for few 
were enumerated in those days who believed with 
Gibbon and Frankhn that the French tongue 
might absorb all other speech, — the patriotism of 
the youthful population ran no less wild than the 
literary ravings of the schoolmasters and the would- 
be philologists ; yet, as time has proved, with like 
innocence to the detriment of the Republic. The 
continental songs of revolutionary renown were 



344 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

sung here and there in divers parts of the city, by 
the old soldiers congregated at places of public 
resort, who renewed their martial ardor by melody 
and mead, a beverage now almost forgotten, but 
then largely purchasable at the Knickerbocker 
taverns, along the Stuyvesant lane or Bowery. 
The Duyckincks have not in their Cyclopaedia of 
American Literature, among their ballads of the 
Indian, French, and Eevolutionary times, more 
striking instances of j)oetic license than I have 
often listened to, at these patriotic festivals. I 
give a verse from one of these most popular songs, 
vociferated to the tune of Malbrook : 

King George sent his sheep-stealers, 

Poor refugees and tories, 

King George sent his sheep-stealera 

To filch for mutton here : 

But Yankees were hard dealers, 

They sold their sheep skins dear. 

Wars and rumors of wars kept the juveniles alive. 
Social companies of youngsters were formed, ac- 
coutred with wooden guns and kettle drums, and 
were perpetually seen, with braggart front in harm- 
less squads, marching with the air of Captain 
Bobadil, chanting some piece of continental poetry : 

Behold ! the conquering Yankees come 
With sound of fife and beat of drum ; 
Says General Lee to General Howe, 
What do you think of the Yankees now ? 



AMERICAN LITEEATURE. 345 

But these trifles were looked upon as the flying 
cloud ; the nation had ripe men at its head ; gov- 
ernment was successfully securing the measures 
for commerce and finance ; the schools were daily 
stronger with better teachers, and the halls of col- 
leges were better supphed with candidates for ele- 
vated instruction. The press was more prolific, and 
something beside the Fool of Quality and Evelina, 
the Shepherd of Salisbury Plain and George Barn- 
well, were with the reading public. Pope, and 
Anne Kadchfie and Monk Lewis, might be found 
on the stalls, with Bonaparte's Campaigns in Italy, 
a work filled with the martial achievements of the 
great soldier, and dedicated to Col. Burr, by the 
translator John Davis, who affirmed that the ex- 
ploits of Alexander the Great were the marches of 
a mere holiday captain compared with the cam- 
paigns of the French general. Franklin's Life 
and Essays were in everybody's hands. Dobson, 
of Philadelphia, had heroically undertaken the re- 
publication of the Encyclopgedia Britannica, and 
Collins, of New Jersey, about the same time, had 
issued his highly prized quarto Family Bible. Nor 
were our New York publishers lukewarm at the 
printing of elaborate works of grave import and 
scholastic value. If, however, we except the Poems 
of Freneau and the reprint of Burns, we find Kttle 
in the region of the muses that issued from the 

15* 



346 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

press ; Clifton, Honeywood, Low, and Linn, were 
our prominent domestic poets. 

The Delia Cruscan muse now, however, invaded 
us : Mrs. Kobin son's Poems was a dog-eared vol- 
ume ; and the song of the melodious Bard, Moore, 
" I knew by the smoke that so gracefully curled," 
received a popularity surpassing that of perhaps 
any other verses. It found its way in the daily 
journals, weekly museums, weekly visitors and 
ladies' magazines ; it was printed on single sheets, 
placarded at inns and in stage coaches ; it travel- 
led to the races as the inner lining of hats ; it oc- 
cupied the cabins of the wood boats, and was found 
surrounding the trunk of the orchard tree ; it was 
among the earliest of our music printing, and old 
Dr. Anderson, now some eighty years of age, our 
first engraver on wood, still alive and still busy, 
gave it illustrations ; it was seen among the con- 
tents of the young misses' reticule, and was read 
in secret at the doors of churches, wliile the youth- 
ful maiden was tarrying for a partner to accom- 
pany her within the house of worship. My de- 
fective memory does not permit me to state posi- 
tively that Blanchard, in his aeronautic expedi- 
tions, wafted it to the skies. In short, it was 
everywhere. But the prospects of a French war 
and Hail Columbia ere long limited the duration 
of this electric poem ; and as if to facilitate this 
object, here and there appeared a sylvan rhymist 



BELLA CRUSCAN BARDS. 347 

who entwined a cliaplet of the Kosa Matilda order. 
What had been considered rare, now lost its fresh- 
nesSj and spurious articles had currency in the 
market without detection by the multitude. The 
insidious assaults of the Baviad and Maviad, from 
the pen of Gifford, seriously crippled the progress 
of this species of sentimentaHsm ; but the pre- 
tensions of the Delia Cruscan finery came at last 
to a somewhat sudden and unexpected end in the 
humorous effusion of Barrett : * 

TO DOROTHY PULVERTAFT. 
" If Black Sea, White Sea, Red Sea ran 
On tide of ink to Ispahan ; 
If all the geese in Lincoln fens. 
Produced spontaneous well-made pens ; 
If Holland old, or Holland new, 
One wond'rous sheet of paper grew ; 
Could I by stenographic power 
Write twenty libraries an hour, 
And should I sing but half the grace 
Of half a freckle *ii thy face ; 
Each syllable I wrote, should reach — 
From Inverness to Bognor's beach ; 
Each hairstroke be a river Rhine, 
Each verse an equinoctial line." 



* 



The author of those exquisite lines, occurring in his poem 



entitled " Woman " : 

" Not she with traitrous kiss her master stung, 
Not she denied him with unfaithful tongue ; 
iShe, when apostles fled, could danger hrave, 
Last at his cross, and earliest at his grave." 

Lines dear to the heart of the world as a beloved proverb. 



348 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

One or two additional circumstances may be 
stated to strengthen what has already been said, 
rather than create doubt as to the accuracy of our 
narrative. Campbell and Bloomfield appeared as 
authors in London with little interval between 
them. The Pleasures of Hope and the Farmer's 
Boy were here reprinted nearly simultaneously ; 
the former had been subjected to the revision of 
Dr. Anderson, the editor of the British Poets ; the 
latter had undergone the incubation of Capel Lofft. 
Thus fortified, there was little hesitation as to the 
safety of the undertaking. Such was the impor- 
tance attached to these works, that the rival pub- 
lishers blazoned forth their labors, so that every 
corner of the city was enlivened by large placards 
announcing the important fact. It is almost su- 
perfluous to add, that with the literary taste which 
had been cherished, the Farmer's Boy outran in 
popularity the Pleasures^ of Hope. As the case 
now stands, Campbell makes one of every dozen 
volumes we meet with, while it might be difficult 
to find a copy of Bloomfield. 

In 1804 Scott enriched the j)oetic world with 
his Lay of the Last Minstrel. Soon after its ap- 
pearance a presentation copy of the work in 
luxurious quarto was received by a lady, then a 
resident of this city, a native of Scotland, and 
who had been most intimate with the author when 
school companions in the same institution. It 



Scott's minstrel. 349 

was seen that the Minstrel was a classic, and the 
volume circulated widely among friends. It shortly 
after fell into the hands of a publishing house, and 
the great question now to be decided was, whether 
it could bear an American reprint, keeping in view 
the primary object of the bookseller, that the 
wheel of fortune must turn in the right way. A 
literary coterie was selected who might determine 
the chances of adventure. Among other dissuasive 
arguments, the Lay was pronounced too local in 
its nature, and its interest obsolete ; its measure 
was considered too varied and irregular, and it had 
not the harmony of tuneful Pope. It was rejected 
by the critical tribunal. Longworth, however, 
brought sufficient resolution to bear, and printed 
in his Belles-Let tres Kepository of 1805, the uni- 
versally known introduction to the first canto. 
Such was the cool and calculating reception of Scott 
with us. One might almost think from the open- 
ing lines of the poem, that the poet had, with 
prophetic vision, foreseen himself in the New 
World : 

" The way was long, the night was cold, 

The Minstrel was infirm and old." 

• 

These were probably the first lines of Walter 
Scott's writings that ever issued from an American 
press. The memorable quarto is still preserved 
with many associations by the venerable lady to 
whom the illustrious author presented it, Mrs. 



350 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

Divie Bethune, the founder of our Infant schools. 
Who can now tell the hundreds of thousands of 
volumes of this noble writer which the press of 
this country has brought forth ? 

We are not to be abashed at the recital of 
these occurrences concerning the early condition 
of the press. They were associated, and naturally 
grew out of the spirit of the times and the condi- 
tion of the Kepublic. Scott was a new name 
among authors, and elegant letters are not among 
the first wants of a people. Yet it will be con- 
ceded that at that very period a broad foundation 
was already being laid, on which at no remote day 
literature, as well as science, would command its 
disciples. The trepidation at the hazard of print- 
ing a few leaves of poetry experienced by some, is 
to be judged merely as an individual infirmity, in- 
asmuch as we find that even then typography was 
prohfic of works of voluminous extent, and many 
of its products at that day constitute a sound por- 
tion of existing libraries. Longworth himself was 
a man of enterprise, but he had bought experience 
by his ornamental edition of Hayley's Triumphs 
of Temper, and he was moreover sustaining his 
Shakspeare Gallery at no small sacrifice ; while 
we find that Evert Duyckinck, Isaac Collins, Geo. 
F. Hopkins, Samuel Campbell, and T. and J. 
Swords, were the leading men to whom we may 
turn for evidence that the press was not idle, and 



LITERARY CHARACTERS. 351 

for illustration of the rising capabilities of the 
book-publishers' craft. An author was a scarce 
article in those days, about the beginning of the 
nineteenth century ; the returns for Uterary labor 
must have been small. Noah Webster was un- 
questionably the most successful of the tribe, and 
in his wake followed the geographer Morse. The 
city library, and the circulating library of Caritat, 
constituted pretty much all the establishments of 
that order we possessed. Pintard was then at 
New Orleans, and years elapsed before he and the 
excellent William Wood began to think of the 
Apprentices' Library, and to suggest the Mariners' 
Library for ships at sea. The Mercantile Library, 
now so vast a concern, was not then dreamt of, and 
Philip Hone, with all his ardor as a patriotic citi- 
zen, had not as yet enlisted in the great cause of 
knowledge, or manifested that attention to those 
important interests which absorbed the years of 
his more advanced life. In a pedestrian excursion 
through our then thinly populated streets, one 
might see the learned Bishop Provoost, the ample 
Dr. Mitchill and his colleague Dr. Miller, Dr. Bay- 
ley, Dr. Hosack, Dr. Livingston, Dr. S. Miller, Dr. 
Mason, and Dunlap, all writers ; Gaines, the deep- 
read reporter ; Cheetham and Coleman, the an- 
tagonistic editors ; Kent, afterwards the great 
Chancellor. In the court room we might behold 
Hamilton and Burr, Harrison, Brockholst Living- 



352 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

ston and Martin Wilkins, Golden and Slosson, 
Hoffman and Pendleton, and young Wells.'*' 

The literary struggles of those days deserve 
more ample notice, but our task may be honestly 
abridged at this time. The curious in a knowl- 
edge of literary toil, in the progress of letters, and 
in the details of authorship, will not fail frequent 
consultation of the several works of the late Dr. 
Griswold, a faithful pioneer of mental acumen in 
this department of study, and turn with renewed 
delight and increased satisfaction to the Biograph- 

* To render these imperfect sketches of the times less defec- 
tive, I had designed to notice briefly the New York Bar, with 
which I was partially acquainted, by my repeated visits at the 
courts ; often as medical wifness in behalf of the people in crimi- 
nal cases involving medical jurisprudence ; but my resources are 
not adequate to the great subject, and the undertaking is the less 
necessary after the precious and interesting History of the Court 
of Common Pleas, from the pen of the Hon. Charles P. Daly, 
one of the Judges, and printed in volume 1st of the Report of 
Cases, by Counsellor E. Delafield Smith. Some forty-five years 
ago, my lamented friend and associate of Columbia College, 
Samuel Berrian, brother of the venerable Rector of Trinity 
Church, commenced a series of Sketches of the Members of the 
Bar, which appeared in Dennie's Portfolio. His first subject was 
Josiah Ogden Hoffman, with whom he was a pupil. The great 
men of the legal profession of those days to which I allude, were 
indeed by universal concurrence, enumerated among the master 
minds of the land ; and I have often heard it said, that the voice 
of the law, from their lips, was the harmony of the world. Legal 
medicine, I am inclined to think, received more homage in the 
days of the great Thomas Addis Emmet and the Hon. Hugh 
Maxwell, the District Attorney, than it had before or has since. 



haeper's book entertainment. 353 

ical Essays of tlie festhetic Tiickermarij and the 
pages of the Cyclop£edia of American Literature, 
by the Messrs. Duyckinck. When thoroughly in- 
vestigated, the candid inquirer may wonder that 
under such difficulties so much was in reality ac- 
complished. 

So long ago as in 1802 I had the pleasure of 
witnessing the first social gathering of American 
publishers at the old City Hotel, Broadway, an 
organization under the auspices of the venerable 
Matthew Carey. About thirty years after I was 
one of a large assembly brought together by the 
Brothers Harper's great entertainment. I remem- 
ber well the literary wares displayed on that first 
memorable occasion, and I still see in " my mind's 
eye" the prominent group of American authors 

Emmet was profoundly learned as a physician ; and upon his arrival 
in this country in 1804, dehberated whether to enter upon the 
practice of medicine or enter the courts of law. In all cases 
of death that came before Emmet requiring medical testimony, 
an examination of the brain he made a prerequisite. It is not 
irrelevant to add, that Dr. James S. Stringham is to be considered 
the founder of Medical Jurisprudence in this country. He was 
the first Avho gave lectures on this science in America, and was 
my predecessor in the chair of Forensic Medicine in the Univer- 
sity of New York. His taste for this knowledge he originally 
imbibed from his able preceptor. Dr. Duncan, of Edinburgh. His 
reading on the subject was extensive, from the elaborate investi- 
gations of Paulus Zacchias, down to the recent productions of 
Fodere and Mahon. A fuller account of him may be found in 
my Sketch, in Beck's Medical Jurisprudence. He was a native of 
New York, and died in 181*7. 



354 HISTORICAL DISCOUKSE. 

who participated in the festivities of the latter 
celebration. Again in 1855 a complimentary fes- 
tival of the New York Book Publishers' Associa- 
tion to authors and booksellers took place at the 
Crystal Palace. A comparative view of these 
three periods in literary progress would furnish an 
instructive •illustration of the workings of the 
American mind and of the enterprise and capa- 
bilities of the American press. The venerable 
Matthew Carey at the primary meeting held forth, 
in earnest language, persuasives to renewed meet- 
ings of a like nature as the most effective means 
for the promotion and diffusion of knowledge. 
Isaac Collins, that jewel of a man for solid worth 
and integrity, concurred in sentiment. At the 
Harper entertainment similar opinions proceeded 
from many minds, and the liveliest responses in 
confirmation were listened to from Chancellor 
Kent and a large number of native writers of ce- 
lebrity. At the last celebration of 1855, which 
was conducted on a scale of great variety and ele- 
gance, Wasliington Irving and a most imposing 
association of distinguished authors, male and 
female, graced .the occasion : those public spirited 
publishers, the Appletons, with Wiley and Put- 
nam, rendered the banquet a genial gathering of 
kindred spirits. The intelligent and patriotic 
Putnam, in an appropriate introductory address, ' 
stated the fact that for twelve years, ending 



FECUNDITY OF THE PRESS. 355 

in 1842, there were published 1,115 different works, 
of these 623 were original ; in the year 1853 there 
were 733 new works published in the United States, 
of which 276 were reprints of English works, 35 
were translations of foreign authors, and 420 orig- 
inal American works ; thus showing an increase of 
about 800 per cent, in less than twenty years. Mr. 
Putnam thus draws the conclusion that literature 
and the book-trade advanced ten times as fast as 
the population. If with these facts we compare 
the numbers printed of each edition, the growth is 
still greater ; editions at the present time varying 
from 10,000, 30,000, 75,000, and even 300,000. 
The Magazine of the Messrs. Harper reaches the 
astounding number at each issue of 180,000. On 
this ' last memorable occasion of the publishers' 
celebration our distinguished poet, Bryant, re- 
sponded to a sentiment on American literature in 
his happiest manner. I quote a few lines from his 
suggestive address : "The promise of American 
authorship, given by the appearance of Cotton 
Mather, has never been redeemed till now. In 
him the age saw one of its ripest scholars, though 
formed in the New England schools and by New 
England libraries, in the very infancy of the colo- 
nies ; a man, as learned as the author of the 
Anatomy of Melancholy, and sometimes as quaint- 
ly eloquent, sending out huge quartos as the fruit 
of his labors, interspersed with duodecimos, the 



356 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

fruit of his recreations ; but his publications ex- 
ceeded the number of the days of the year. After 
his time, in the hundred and fifty years which fol- 
lowed, the procession of American authors was a 
straggling one ; at present they are a crowd which 
fairly choke the way ; illustrious historians, able 
and acute theologians, authors of books of travels, 
instructive or amusing, clever novelists, brilliant 
essayists, learned and patient lexicographers. Every 
bush, I had almost said every buttercup of the 
fields has its poet ; poets start up like the soldiers 
of Koderick Dhu, from behind every rock and out 
of every bank of fern." 

I must linger a moment longer on this subject. 
Our literary annals, while they abound with occur- 
rences most gratifying to the intellectual and moral 
advancement of our species, possess yet another 
claim to estimation. The making of books has 
not been an employment of selfish and inert grati- 
fication ; it has proved a prolific source of emol- 
ument, no less remarkable than the pecuhar occa- 
sions which have awakened the talents necessary 
for the healthy exercise of the art itself Liter- 
ature, independently of its own noble nature, has 
superadded to its powers a productive result of 
substantial issue ; and while it beautifies and en- 
riches with precious benefits the progress of civil- 
ization, it has secured the comforts which spring 
up from the wholesome pursuit of other sources 



CONDITION OF AUTHORSHIP. 357 

of wealth. This indeed is the offspring of but a 
recent period among us ; but the fact is not the 
less solacing to the pangs of intellectual labor. 
The huckstering which once marred the trans- 
actions between publishers and authors no longer 
occurs ; the starveling writers whom I now and 
then saw, at about the time of the first meeting 
of our literary venders, the booksellers of 1802, 
have paid the debt of nature, I dare not add pre- 
maturely ; and we can now enroll a list of the 
literary and the scientific who have increased far 
and wide the nation's renown. For a considerable 
while during my early medical career my diagnosis 
often led me to attribute the causes of mental in- 
quietude and physical suffering among this cir- 
cumscribed order of men to inanition ; but if the 
literary squad, as old Dr. Tillary denominated 
them, preserve intact their wonted energies and 
privileges, their improved condition may sometimes 
demand an alterative treatment corresponding 
with that robust state and imposing plethora, in 
which they so generally present themselves to 
our admiration and esteem. Personal observation 
and individual experience may have helped the 
great reform, for not a few must have learned the 
truth of the remark of the playwright, George 
Colman : " Authorship, as a profession, is a veiy 
good walking-stick, but very bad crutches.'' 

Other reflections seem naturally to occur when 



358 HISTOKICAL DISCOURSE. 

contemplating tlie condition of literature among 
■Qs. There are noticeable changes to be observed 
during the past fifty years and upwards in all the 
walks of professional life. The Bar has swollen in 
the number of its members to an enormous mul- 
titude ; its talents and capacity are doubtless ade- 
quate to the fulfilment of its high behests : its 
tact and its sagacity were perhaps never greater 
than at present, but we neither witness nor hear 
of those forensic displays of elocutionary power 
which were formerly so often the theme of public 
remark. Perhaps in any age the brilliant mani- 
festations of oratory exhibited by Hamilton, Morris, 
Livingston, andT^mmet, could be classed only as 
rare exceptions of individual success in the mighty 
art, and justify no grounds of sorrow at the ab- 
sence of any general deficiency of that marvellous 
gift. I have witnessed abroad and at home the 
disciplined speakers of highest celebrity, whose 
genius was enriched with the profoundest wisdom, 
and in whom long practice had accomplished its 
most desirable ends ; such gifted men as Brougham, 
Mackintosh, Grattan, fall far short in effective re- 
sults and in that divine impulse which leads to 
conviction, compared with the mighty and seem- 
ingly unstudied energy of Thomas Addis Emmet. 
I was near the scene when about noon of the 14th 
of November, 1827, in the City Hall Court Koom, 
he was seized by effusion of the brain, in the midst 



EMMET. KENT. 359 

of his vast forensic utterance, and suddenly fell by- 
apoplexy. His robust habit and the nature of his 
attack justified my immediate recourse to the 
lancet ; he was taken home, and every measure 
adopted for his reUef by his old and devoted friend, 
Dr. Macneven, by Dr. Hosack, and myself ; but 
unconscious from the beginning of his attack, he 
continued so some ten hours, when he expired. 
That distinguished jurist, John Duer, with equal 
classical purity and truth, has drawn Emmet's 
character in the inscription engraven on his monu- 
ment. While on the subject of this great pro- 
fession I would fain call to mind the character of 
those eminent judges who stamped that value on 
your judiciary which rendered the New York de- 
cisions the law of the land, Spencer, Piatt, Thomp- 
son, Van Ness, and others ; I would recall Kent 
once again in association with all that ennobles 
moral excellence, dignifies erudition and profes- 
sional life, and secures in perpetuity the fame of 
the learned author of Commentaries on American 
Law ; but the occasion forbids ; and the disciples 
of that high calling will look for such expositions 
from a more appropriate source. 

There is an essential change in the great char- 
acteristics of our pulpit instruction : the spirit of 
polemical controversy has almost wholly died out ; 
the Universalists and the Unitarians are rarely 
molested by counter preaching, and Strebeck, were 



360 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

he now with, us, might anathematize in vain on 
the wrath to come. The elaborate controversies on 
church government and apostolic succession, if 
vivified even with new powers, would fail to secure 
the consideration that once enchained the attention 
of Mason, McLeod, Miller, Hobart, Howe, and 
Bowden. Ezra Stiles Ely might draw his parallels 
between Calvinism and Hopkinsianism, but he 
would remain unanswered by an antagonist im- 
pregnated with the popular spirit of modern the- 
ological desires, and the venerable Dr. Spring, now 
half a century with us, would not deign to mingle 
with the unprofitable contest. The vexed question 
whether a widower may marry his deceased wife's 
sister, absorbing as it once appeared in Levitical 
law, would now leave the pious Dr. Livingston 
without a reader. Whelpley, with his Triangle, 
in^?;e parts, however acute his logic, would search 
in vain for another mathematician like Professor 
Adrain, with provoked risibles, to laugh at his in- 
ferential doctrines. In fine, the spirit of the minis- 
try is vastly changed, and that change is for the 
better. The deists and the theoi:)hilanthropists 
have taken their flight, or put on an altered 
vesture not cognizable for classification. Re- 
ligious controversy, often so acrimonious, is a 
strangier where once it was difficult to avoid en- 
countering it. Polemics, even with the discon- 
tented and the anxious, have lost that charm which 



CHRISTIANITY A DEMOCRATIC ELEMENT. 361 

excited the spirits of every order of advocates to 
secure victory at almost any price. The game of 
life is no longer the game of nine-pins, to knock 
down as many as you can. The ethical doctrines 
of Holy Writ, and the Sermon on the Mount, are 
more than ever the monitors and the guides of 
the Christian believer, and accommodated equally 
to the Ebenezer Chapel and the lofty cathedral ; 
and that preacher who is most likened unto him 
described by Cowj)er, is best equipped, according 
to the order of the day, for the spread of gospel 
love. Christianity is recognized as a democratic 
element, profitable for all conditions of men, as the 
Declaration of Independence and our Constitution 
are the palladium of our civil and rehgious rights. 
Our popular song writer, Morris, has conveyed in 
beautiful verse ideas not unlike the sentimen.ts I 
have thus frankly expressed, in his classical verses 
on the Kock of the Pilgrims. What is applicable 
to the land of the Pilgrims, history tells us is equally 
appUcable to New Amsterdam. 

" The pilgrims of old an example have given 
Of mild resignation, devotion and love, 
Which beams like a star in the blue vault of heaven, 
A beacon-light swung in their mansion above. 

" In church and cathedral we kneel in our prayer, 
Their temple and chapel were valley and hill, 
But God is the same in the aisle and the air, 
And He is the Rock that we lean upon still." 

16 



362 HISTOKICAL DISCOUKSE. 

It were superfluous to ask attention to further 
reflections on tlie state of the Faculty of Physic, 
and the condition of the medical prescriber at the 
present day, after what has been already uttered 
in that section of the discourse which treats of the 
progress of the science of healing, and in an ad- 
dress recently pronounced at the Bellevue Hos- 
pital, concerning the multiplied sources for clinical 
knowledge ofiered by our innumerable charities, 
sustained by private and public munificence. The 
doctors, hke the lawyers, have multiplied more 
than tenfold during the past fifty years ; higher re- 
quisites are looked for in those who exercise the art, 
and as a general truth they have been fully met, 
corresponding with the march of philosoj)hical and 
medical knowledge, and in their professional pub- 
lications they have given us incontrovertible proofs 
of their instructive merits. 

As associated with literature and authorship, 
none can be ignorant of the worldhke reputation 
secured by our prominent writers. National re- 
nown has followed the Commentaries of Kent, the 
International Law of Wheaton, the Historical 
Orations of Everett, the legal writings of Story, 
the Spanish Literature of Ticknor, the Exploring 
Expeditions of Wilkes and of Perry, the Ee- 
searches of Kobinson, the Biblical learning of Nor- 
ton, the Ornithology of Audubon, the histories of 
Bancroft, Prescott, and Motley, the Field-Book of 



AMERICAN LITERATURE. 363 

Lossing, and the Biographies of Sparks. In states- 
manship the published intellectual legacies of Clay, 
Calhoun, Webster, and Legare, the living manifes- 
tations of Benton, Seward, Curtis, and Elliot, prove 
that the prestige of our country in this regard is 
unimpaired, while the new and improved editions of 
the writings of Washington, Hamilton, Adams, 
Franklin, and Jefferson, evince a wholesome appre- 
ciation of the patriotism of the past. Irving may be 
pronounced a universal classic. The cosmopolitan 
Pliny Miles tells us that even in that seemingly 
benighted region, Iceland, the pages of Irving are 
among the studies of the cultivated. Cooper's 
Forest and Sea Novels are known abroad in almost 
every living language. Where shall we not find 
the poetry of Bryant, HaUeck, Willis, Whittier, 
Holmes, Sprague, Dana, and Percival .^ while the 
melodies of Longfellow have found translators in 
German versification, and Wilde in modern Greek. 
Ethnological studies have commanded the talents 
of Morton, Hawks, Squier, Davis, Turner, Bart- 
lett, Cotheal, Dwight, and Gallatin. Schoolcraft's 
Indian Kesearches, by their variety and magnitude 
have given him claims to lasting gratitude. The 
classical annotations of Anthon and of Felton are 
held in admiration abroad and at home. The 
critical essays of Whipple, Channing, Hillard, and 
Tuckerman, the aesthetic travels of Calvert, the 
romances of Hawthorne and of Melville, and the 



364 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

historical and romantic writings of Simms have met 
with a reception flattering to the most aspiring au- 
thor ; nor am I in this imperfect enumeration to 
forget the classical dramas of Boker ; and the Ke- 
miniscences of that venerable worthy of typograph- 
ical celebrity, Buckingham, and those of that 
faithful and genial chronicler, Manlius Sargent. 
Surely I have said enough to answer the inter- 
rogatory of Sidney Smith ; he who is not sat- 
isfied may consult the Cyclopsedia of the Duyc- 
kincks. 

Within the period now under consideration 
what a new range in versatility, in talent, and in 
increasing power, has American journalism as- 
sumed. We are assured that those papers, the 
Times, the Herald, and Tribune, have a daily issue 
varying from forty to seventy thousand, and a 
weekly impression of double that number. How 
has the case about the time of the adoption of our 
State Constitution. Old Hugh Gaine, with his 
almost solitary Gazette, was satisfied with the sale 
of some three or four hundred papers, he himself 
being compositor, pressman, folder and distributer 
of his literary ware. Hoe's leviathan press of the 
present day throws ofi" some twenty or thirty thou- 
sand copies per hour. If to these circumstances 
we add the multiplying capacity of the press, by 
the process of stereotyping, a device which I have 
years ago shown to have originated in New York, 



AMERICAN LITERATURE. 365 

by Golden and Franklin,* we may still more fully 
comprehend the intellectual progeny the great art 
brings forth. Have we need to wonder that a sin- 
gle American edition may outnumber twenty or 
thirty of the London publisher ? 

For much of this salutary change in the Eepub- 
lic of Letters, let all praise be given to knowledge 
more available ; the appetite grows by what it feeds 
on ; to the higher culture of the people, and to the 
patronage of our enlightened publishers. I allude 
to such patrons as the Appletons, the Harpers, 
Scribner, Wiley and Putnam. I am limited to 
New York in these specifications. But the 
leading Boston firms are identified with our 
national historians, 23oets, and essayists. What 
Childs and Peterson have done for the gen- 
erous enterprise of the lamented Kane, both in 
the mechanical execution of those endearing vol- 
umes, the Arctic Expedition, and in the returns 
secured by liberal appropriation in artistic display, 
is enough of itself for the renown of Philadelphia. 
Nor can I omit to notice in this connection, that 
the most complete and authentic Dictionary of 
Authors in our vernacular tongue, (Biographical, 
Bibliographical, and Critical,) is in progress of 
publication under the auspices of this enterprising 
house, for which noble monument of literary toil 

* See Hosack and Francis' American Medical and Philosophical 
Register, vol. 1, 1811. 



366 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE, 

and industry we are indebted to the accomplished 
Samuel A. Allibone, of Philadelphia ; that the 
Clerical Biographies of the erudite Dr. Sprague, 
now in press, promise a rich body of original eccle- 
siastical history from an early date to the present 
time ; while in our own city, we are favored by 
Appleton & Co., with a New Cyclopaedia of Gen- 
eral Knowledge, especially rich in native science 
and biography, brought down to the latest day, 
prepared by the erudite and gifted editors, George 
Ripley and Charles A. Dana, assisted by enlight- 
ened collaborators of literary and scientific renown. 
I believe I have secured the concurrence of my 
audience in the opinion that I have already said 
enough of the eventful Past in its complex rela- 
tions with the New York Historical Society. If I 
mistake not, the narrative which I have given of 
the passing events and living movements of our 
times elucidates the incalculable value of your 
Institution, and points out how indispensable is 
the duty to cherish that conservative element 
which your charter demands. The fragmentary 
information brought together in this discourse may 
not be wholly without its use : it may serve at 
least to furnish some hints to subsequent writers 
who may venture to fill up, with higher aspirations, 
the mighty void which exists in the annals of this 
vast Metropolis. With the philosophical historian 
every new fact will be duly appreciated, the tran- 



REFLECTIONS. 367 

sitory nature of many occurrences better under- 
stood in their relation to simultaneous events, and 
the men of consequence in their day more faith- 
fully estimated. Skill indeed will be demanded 
in selection and judgment in arrangement, but an 
enlarged vision will comprehend the truth, that 
what seems temporary may sometimes become per- 
manent, that what is local often becomes national. 
The task assigned me by your courtesy for this 
day's celebration has been executed amidst many 
cares, and not without apprehensions as to the 
result. The moments seized for preparation have 
not always been the most auspicious ; but my na- 
tive feelings and my love of the olden times, have 
prompted the spirit and the tendency of chis 
address. ^' Whatever," says the great moralist, 
Dr. Johnson, " makes the past, the distant, and the 
future predominate over the present, exalts us in 
the scale of thinking beings." None can feel more 
deeply than myself the imperfect execution of the 
service I have attempted, and none of its deficien- 
cies causes greater uneasiness than the circum- 
stance that I have omitted notice of many of the 
eminent dead whose names ought to be placed on 
a record of gratitude, for their labors in behalf of 
this Society in its earlier existence. While I am 
conscious that the men of to-day are not inferior 
to those whose ranks they now supply, I have also 
been compelled to overlook a long catalogue of 



368 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

living worthies, who still co-operate in the great 
design of rearing this Historical Institution to na- 
tional consideration. Fortunately your printed 
Collections and Proceedings, a long series, have 
perpetuated the contributions of many of these 
distinguished members, and posterity will seek in- 
struction and delight in the discourses which you 
have preserved of your CHnton and Yerplanck, 
your Morris and Hosack, your Mitchill and Blunt, 
your Wheaton and Lawrence, your Kent and But- 
ler, your Bradford and Bancroft. The records of 
your secretary will point out your indebtedness to 
those long tried members who have adhered to 
your interests in seasons of greatest depression ; 
Chancellor Matthews, the founder, I may add, of 
our City University ; George B. Rapelye, a friend 
with a Knickerbocker's heart, who has often invig- 
orated my statements by his minute knowledge ; 
Samuel Ward, a generous benefactor to your rich 
possessions ; and Albert Gallatin, many years your 
presiding officer, who needs no voucher of mine to 
place him in the front rank of intellectual mor- 
tals. 

The thousand and one occurrences which have 
weighed on my mind while in this attempt to 
sketch a picture of the times in New York during 
the past sixty years, have made the difficulty of 
choice perplexing to recollection and embarrassing 
to the judgment. It might have been more ac- 



REFLECTIONS. 369 

ceptable to many had this Discourse been concen- 
trated on some special topics of general interest, 
or that the importance of history as a philosophical 
study had been set forth, the better to urge the 
high claims which this institution proffers to the 
countenance and support of this enlightened com- 
munity. I stand amenable to such criticism, yet 
I fain would trust that the leaves of memory which 
I have opened may not be altogether without their 
use. An indifferent observer of the events of so 
long a period in a city of such progress, could not 
fail to have arrived at a knowledge of many things 
characteristic of the age and profitable as practi- 
cal wisdom ; to one who has ever cherished a deep 
sympathy in whatever adds to the renown of the 
city of his birth, or increases the benefits of its 
population, the accumulation of facts would nat- 
urally become almost formidable ; and while with 
becoming deference his aim on such an occasion as 
the present would lead him in his selection to 
group together, without tedious minuteness, the 
more prominent incidents which have marked its 
career, it might be tolerated if he here and there, 
with fond reluctance, dwelt upon what most in- 
volved his feelings, even should the subject-matter 
prove deficient in popular importance. In the 
wide and fertile field which I have entered, it re- 
quired an anthologist of rare gifts to select with 
wisdom products the healthiest, the richest, and 
16* 



370 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

most grateful for general acceptance, and most 
conducive to the general design. 

The inquiry may be fairly put, has the New 
York Historical Society stood an isolated institu- 
tion during its long career, and are its merits of an 
exclusive character ? It may be promptly an- 
swered, No. It was preceded in its formation by 
the Massachusetts Historical Society, a bright ex- 
ample for imitation, some ten or twelve years ; and 
it has been followed by the organization of many 
other historical societies formed in different and 
widely-distant States of the Union. They have 
grown up around her, not by the desire of imitation, 
but by the force of utility ; and I will be bold 
enough to affirm, that consultation of their nu- 
merous volumes is indispensable to an author who 
aims at writing a faithful local or general history 
of the country. I speak thus earnestly because I 
think these works are too much overlooked or 
neglected. The conjoint labors of these several 
associations, with commendable diligence, are se- 
curing for future research, authentic materials 
touching events in history, in the arts, in science, 
in jurisprudence, and in literature ; and if I mis- 
take not, the intelligence of the people is awak- 
ened to their import ; individual pride and State 
ambition have been invoked in furtherance of the 
measure, and results productive of national good 
must crown the efforts. Truth, it is often said, is 



ETHNOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 371 

reserved for posterity — truth promulgated may be 
doubly fortified by these historical societies. In 
the march of similar pursuits, we may notice the 
American Antiquarian Society, founded by the 
late Isaiah Thomas, and the New England His- 
torical and Genealogical Society, a recent organi- 
zation, whose labors, however already, amount to 
many volumes, aided by the herculean devotion of 
Samuel G. Drake, and the still more recent His- 
torical Magazine published by Richardson, now of 
New York. This last-named periodical gives 
promise of excellence of the highest order, and 
demands the patronage of every genuine lover of 
American annals. 

I would caU attention to our New York Ethno- 
logical Society, now founded several years. Its vol- 
umes evince that the Association has adepts 
among its members able to throw light on the 
most intricate subjects of human inquiry. Its pres- 
ent president is the learned Dr. Eobinson, so dis- 
tinguished in philology and biblical literature. 

StiU more recently a Geographical Society has 
sprung up among us. Though of but short dura- 
tion, its transactions have commanded approbation 
both abroad and at home. Among its leading 
members is Henry Grinnell, the well known pro- 
moter of the Arctic expeditions under the direc- 
tion of Doctor Kane. The Rev. Dr. Hawks is 
the present head of this association. 



372 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

As connected with the great design of pro- 
moting useful knowledge, the institution of the 
Lyceum of Natural History in this city may be 
included in the number. This association has now 
been in operation forty years. It was founded by 
Mitchill in union with Dr. Torrey, the late Dr. 
Townsend, and a few others. The Lyceum is 
most strictly devoted to natural history ; it created 
an early impulse to studies illustrative of our nat- 
ural products in the several kingdoms of nature. 
Many of the rarest treasures of our marine waters 
have become known by the investigations of the 
Lyceum : among its scientific supporters are Tor- 
rey, De Kay, Cooper, Le Conte, and Jay. Like 
the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 
the Boston Natural History Society, and the So- 
ciety of Charleston, S. C, with its President Hol- 
brook, its opinions are authoritative. 

The impulse given to intellectual labor in these, 
our own times, is still further shown in the com- 
pletion of that great undertaking, the Natural 
History of the State of New York. This vast 
project was, I believe, commenced during the ad- 
ministration of Governor Seward ; and if we value 
science by the research which it displays, this ex- 
tensive work presents claims of unquestionable 
excellence to our recognition. Its able authors, 
with a scrutinizing observation that has never 
tired, have unfolded the richness of our native 



NATURAL HISTORY OF THE STATE. 373 

productions to the delight of the naturalist and 
the cultivators of our domestic resources. The 
work is a lasting memorial of the public spirit of 
the State, and an index to the legislative wisdom 
of its rulers. The fehcitous introduction to the 
entire series of volumes from the pen of Governor 
Seward, will always be perused with emotions of 
patriotic pride. Associated with another measure 
not less public spirited, is the Documentary His- 
tory of the State of New York, under the direc- 
tion of executive authority, and prepared for the 
press by the editorial supervision of Dr. O'Cal- 
laghan. Its importance cannot be over-estimated ; 
and the judgment displayed in the disposition of 
its multifarious materials, increases the desire that 
no impediment may arrest the completion of a mis- 
cellany of knowledge hitherto inaccessible. Less 
could not be said of the labors of Dr. O'Callaghan, 
when we remember the precious materials he has 
at command, and that these documents include 
the Brodhead Papers. 

Is it speaking too earnestly, when it is said 
that the Republic at large appears determined to 
secure her history from doubt and uncertainty ? 
Associations for the preservation of historical mate- 
rials seem springing up in every State. We might 
enumerate among the most prominent of these 
State institutions, that of Pennsylvania, of Rhode 
Island, of Maine, of Connecticut, of New Jersey, of 



374 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

South Carolina, Georgia, and very recently the 
Historical Society of Iowa. We are assured 
further that religious denominations are engaged 
in like duties, to secure authentic records of the 
trials and progress of their respective creeds. In 
our own city the Baptists have formed an his- 
torical society, at the head of which is the vener- 
able David T. Valentine, the editor of the Cor- 
poration Manual, which yearly enlarges our topo- 
graphical and civil history ; and an association of 
the Protestant Episcopal faith has recently pub- 
lished two volumes of Historical Kecords in illus- 
tration of the early condition of the Church. All 
this looks well ; and I am confident that our asso- 
ciation contemplates with pleasurable emotions 
these rival efforts in so good a cause. 

The New York Historical Society has work 
enough for her strongest energies to accomphsh. 
The State under whose auspices she flourishes, is 
indeed an empire ; the transactions which claim 
her consideration possess an inherent greatness, and 
are momentous in their nature ; her colonial career 
is pregnant with instructive events ; the advances 
she has made, and the condition she has secured 
in her State policy, afi'ord lessons which the wisest 
may study with profit. Long neglect has only in- 
creased the duty of investigation, and added value 
to every new revelation offered. The Hudson and 
Niagara are but types of her physical formation. 



HISTORY. 375 

Her geology has dissolved the theories of the closet, 
and given new principles to geognostic science. 
Her men of action have been signally neglected. 
Feeble records only are to be found of her most 
eminent statesmen. Where shall we look, through- 
out our country's annals, for a more heroic spirit, 
one of more personal courage, of greater devotion 
to his country, one greater in greatest trial, one of 
more decision of character, one of sterner integ- 
rity, than Gov. George CHnton, to whom this 
State and the Union are under such mighty obli- 
gations ; and yet we fruitlessly search for a worthy 
memorial of him. Fellow associates, I repeat it, 
there is work enough to do. 

I have spoken of history and its many relations. 
History the schoolmen have divided into sacred 
and profane. All history may be deemed sacred, 
inasmuch as it teaches the ways of God, whose 
eternity knows neither time nor space, and unfolds 
the anatomy of that microcosm man, the image of 
his Maker. History is a deep philosophy, yet 
capable of appropriation to vulgar designs ; it is a 
prodigious monitor, a mighty instructor. Be it 
our aim to use it for beneficent ends, cherishing 
as a rule of life the revealed truth, that there is 
a still higher wisdom within our reach, and that 
our intelligence, however great, must recognize 
the inflexible sentence, uttered of old ; the tree of 
knowledge is not the tree of life. 



376 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

The rapid sketch I have given, however im- 
perfect, is, I believe, authentic. Brief as is the 
period included in my reminiscent glance, it is in 
some important respects as much a picture of the 
past, as a century's retrospect would be in Euro- 
pean communities. Not only have many of the 
individuals I have attempted to describe, passed 
away, but not a few of the local, social, political, 
and professional characteristics of New York, sixty 
years ago, are now traditional. In the old world 
we are called a fast people, and the history of no 
spot in our vast confederacy, is more impressed 
with the change that seems a normal condition of 
our republican life, than this city. Its original 
land-marks are scarcely to be recognized ; its 
population is utterly transformed ; its resources 
indefinitely enlarged ; nay, to the backward and 
loving gaze of a venerable Knickerbocker, its 
individuality is almost lost. I think there has 
been manifest in this discourse, a sympathy with 
progress, vivid and earnest enough to save me 
from the imputation of a prejudiced and obtuse 
conservatism. I have expressed, and certainly 
feel no want of interest in new truth, improved 
methods, and growing knowledge ; I am so far 
of the old school as to firmly believe that integrity 
is the corner-stone of Christian morality, that lit- 
erature, art, and science are the noblest human 
vocations, that benevolence is the most obvious 



NEW YORK, COSMOPOLITAN. 377 

duty, friendship the greatest solace, domestic ties 
the purest sphere, and simple habits the most sa- 
lubrious hygiene ; I am also loyal to the aspira- 
tions of humanity, and firm in the conviction that 
God's will ordains the highest development of our 
race. 

If I have betrayed an honest local attachment 
and some national partiality for the men and 
things amid which I was born and live, it is not 
because I am blind to the faults and insensible to 
the dangers of our beloved metropolis. Her for- 
tunes have been marvellously prosperous, but her 
position is unique. As the mart of the nation, 
millions of emigrants land on her quays, thousands 
of foreigners crowd her thoroughfares : more casual 
residents dwell here for temporary objects than in 
any city on earth. Every natign of Europe is 
represented, every phase of opinion finds voice, the 
refuse and the cream of the old world float on the 
surface or disappear in the whirlpool of New York 
life : read the signs down town, scan the draw- 
ing-rooms of the upper quarter, turn over the 
journals, look in at the places of public amuse- 
ment, observe the festive celebrations, enter the 
churches, and you will find somewhat, — a man, a 
custom, a language, a vocation or a faith borrowed 
from every quarter of the globe. 

New York is the most cosmopolitan of modern 
cities ; hence, in a great measure, its ineffective 



378 HISTORICAL DISCOUESE. 

municipal government, its rowdyism, its perpetual 
demolition, its spasmodic and versatile phenomena, 
its advantages and its nuisances, its dangers and 
its blessings as a place of abode ; larger opportu- 
nities with greater risks, more liberality of senti- 
ment with less rectitude of principle, more work 
and more dissipation, higher achievement and 
deeper recklessness ; in a word, more obvious and 
actual extremes of fortune, character, violence, 
philanthropy, indifference and zeal, taste and 
vulgarity, isolation and gregariousness, business 
and pleasure, vice and piety. Wherever there is 
more in quantity there is a corresponding latitude 
in quality. Enterprise hath here an everlasting 
carnival ; fashion is often rampant ; financial crises 
sweep away fortunes ; reputations are made and 
lost with magiqal facility ; friends come and go, 
life and death, toil and amusement, worth and 
folly, truth and error, poetry and matter of fact 
alternate with more than dramatic celerity. 

The multifarious access to New York, the nu- 
cleus it forms to ocean and continent, the remark- 
able salubrity, the abundant capital, and the large 
floating population ; its natural resources and the 
circumstances of its history, all conduce to these 
results. Our duty as natives and citizens under 
such conditions is apparent. We should cling to 
republican simplicity, to personal independence, 
to fidelity in our respective spheres ; we should 



NEW YORK IN THE PAST. 379 

obey a patriotic inspiration, and in hoiiseliold and 
vocation, by word and act, keep up a public spirit 
which repudiates external corruption, insists on 
civic duty, promotes education, defies the en- 
croachments of material luxury, fiscal recklessness 
and political turpitude. Whatever is said of the 
indifference to moral and intellectual distinction 
and the slavery to gain prevalent, men and women 
here assuredly find their just level and pass eventu- 
ally for what they are worth. Fraud enjoys but a 
temporary success ; imposture is sure to be un- 
masked, and benevolence to be duly honored. 'New 
York in the past affords us innumerable precious 
memories and honorable achievements : New York 
in the future may, through the loyalty of her 
faithful children, reach a height of auspicious re- 
nown, commensurate with her mercantile fame, 
her historical significance and her material pros- 
perity. The Dutch gable ends have disappeared, 
the unpretending hospitality has vanished, the 
rural vicinage is demolished ; Peter Stuyvesant's 
pear tree is the last relic of suburban gardens ; 
theology has ramified, and in so doing miti- 
gated its rancor ; physic has multiplied her dis- 
ciples ; law has acquired a thousand clever, for a 
dozen brilliant votaries ; the opera has outvied 
the drama ; rents have become fabulous ; land has 
risen in value beyond all precedent ; Yankees have 
driven out burgomasters ; Cuban segars Holland 



380 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

pipes ; railways old fashioned gigs, and omnibuses 
family chariots: the tonsorial occupation is all 
but superseded by the perpetual holiday of beards ; 
and skirts, instead of being gathered up as of 
old, sway in fixed expansion on the encroaching 
hoop ; turbans, shoe-buckles, cues, the pillory, 
spinning-wheels, and short ruffles are obsolete, 
while the "last of the cocked hats" is visi- 
ble in our streets ; but the good old Knicker- 
bocker honesty and geniality may yet be found by 
some firesides. "We have eloquent proof that Wash- 
ington's memory is still tenderly revered, that 
Franklin's maxims are yet reliable, that Hamil- 
ton's political sagacity and chivalry are not for- 
gotten, that Fulton's inventive genius and De 
Witt Clinton's comprehensive polity are still ap- 
preciated ; and while this remains true, New York 
" still lives," the New York where the principle of 
internal improvement was initiated, the liberty of 
the press earliest recognized, and the first Presi- 
dent of the republic inaugurated. 

Mr. Pi^esident : 

For a series of years you have held the ele- 
vated office of head of the Historical Society. The 
distinguished men, your predecessors, who have 
filled that prominent station, have, I believe, all 
departed. You stand the sole representative of a 
long list of worthies who have discharged trusts 



HISTORICAL TREASURES. 381 

similar to those committed to you,. and which your 
wisdom and experience in public councils and in 
state affairs have enabled you to fortify with an 
ability which reflects credit on your administra- 
tion, and has proved signally advantageous to this 
institution. The duties which have devolved on you 
may at times have been onerous, but if I can fathom 
your nature, must have proved grateful to your 
feelings, and congenial to your patriotism. Your 
copious reading had made you familiar with the 
great events of the two wars which this state 
waged, and in which she was so great a sufferer, but 
in which she proved successful : more valuable 
materials, growing out of such circumstances, for 
the future historian, could not be gathered from 
any other colony. This Society, amidst its other 
treasures, has secured for the most part these pre- 
cious documents ; and from the period at which 
New York assumed the sovereignty of an inde- 
pendent state, there are few intervals pregnant 
with important events the records of which are not 
to be found in our archives. Thus, Sir, if ever an 
association adhered with fidelity to a Hteral inter- 
pretation of its charter power, it may be affirmed 
to be that in whose transactions you have taken 
so deep an -interest. The work demanded intel- 
ligence, and it received it ; it called for devotion 
and earnestness, and they were at hand ; and 
thus was secured that continuity of effort so re- 



382 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

quisite to accomplish the undertaking. With 
what judgment the work has been executed, must 
be left to the decision of our arbiters, the public ; 
I fear not the verdict. 

Scholarship, the learned have said, was a rare 
acquisition in England, until the time of Bentley. 
It may as truthfully be asserted, that until the 
career of our founder commenced, there was little 
antiquarian zeal among us ; and hence you may 
have perceived, that on several occasions I have 
ventured to place John Pintard in the foremost 
ground in the picture. The head and the heart 
of our eastern brethren exercise a warmer devotion 
for knowledge of this nature, than is found else- 
where in our Union ; and the rare example on 
that account of my old friend proffered its claims 
to my notice in strongest accents. Let me say, 
Sir, that the forerunner in the course you so tri- 
umphantly have maintained, was not a mere holi- 
day officer, but an untiring laborer in the great 
design. The talent he possessed was of pecuhar 
value, and under certain circumstances might have 
commanded the highest premimn. He had a fit- 
ness for the work, and none can rob him of the 
honor. 

Your able Vice-Presidents have, I believe, 
concurred with you, at all times, in furtherance of 
those enlarged plans and that policy, which, as 
occasion demanded, have proved most salutary to 



THE SOCIETY. 383 

the institution. Their enlightened cooperation 
must, on some occasions, have lessened individual 
responsibility, and lightened perplexities in the 
path of duty. I am inclined to think, that there 
is an unity of opinion throughout the Society in 
commendation of the manner in which the various 
services, rendered by your fiscal and other com- 
mittees, your secretaries, corresponding and record- 
ing, have been discharged. In times like these, 
sagacity in finance may be acknowledged wisdom 
of the highest order ; and the fruits of sound fore- 
thought, when demonstrated by palpable results, 
yield arguments that cannot be demolished. I 
have but to add, that your intelligent and inde- 
fatigable librarian has nobly fulfilled his account- 
able appointment. Every thing around me leads 
to the conviction that your literary treasures have 
been preserved ; your MS. records regarded at a 
proper estimate ; your library so disposed, that 
every accommodation can be given to the searcher 
after wisdom in this curious repository of historical 
material. Where aU deserve commendation, and 
there remains nothing for censure, conscious recti- 
tude yields unadulterated satisfaction to official 
capacity. 

Mr. President : An abiding conviction prevails, 
that the interests of the Society have been in proper 
hands, and controlled by wise counsels. The 
memory of your administration will long endure 



384 HISTORICAL DISCOURSE. 

with us. The ornamental and stately edifice, in 
which we are now gathered, erected by the liber- 
ality of our citizens, and in an especial manner 
by that class so often found generous in good 
works, the mercantile community, will, I trust, 
stand, for generations to come, a monument of the 
pubhc spirit of New York — of her love and devo- 
tion to the refined and useful — and vindicate to 
the rising youth of the nation the estimate which 
their fathers formed of the blessings of wisdom de- 
rived from pure historical truth. If I am rightly 
informed, I stand before you at this Anniversary, 
among the oldest living members of this associa- 
tion. Yet have I consoled myself with the pleasing 
thought, while meditating on the eventful occur- 
rences of this day, that although the sun of my 
declining years is nearly set, its last rays, however 
feeble, are reflected from the classical walls of the 
New York Historical Society. 



FINIS. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




014 220 391 1 



